Repressed Sadness Doesn't Work

     When things go away, just seem to drift out of my life, it makes me sad. Oh, that's just life, get over it, the calloused optimist would say. Yet, deep inside them are buried losses and their accompanying sadness' too, waiting to rear their ugly heads in the form of inappropriate emotional outbursts, or some other illness or attention getting behavior. Or maybe their pretending that all it "fine" or "o.k" is camouflaged by their over optimistic or happy persona, afraid that if they didn't present this front that the river of tears would flow without ceasing, and that would scare them.
    Yes, I want to talk about the sadness of life today, and how I am realizing that I suppress, even deny, my own, and the detrimental effects that might have on my happiness. While sounding oxymoronical, let's see how this can be so.
     Suppressed sorrow, not expressed or even acknowledged, can cause one to be depressed. In one's soul, you carry this sadness, whether or not you realize it. Too much carried sadness becomes too much for our soul, and then we are depressed, and many times we don't know why. Over a period of time, this has to have negative effects on our whole being in unseen ways, or maybe in seen ways such as illnesses whether mental, emotional, or physical.
     I just discovered yesterday that I suppress these sad emotions, because I have thought that no one would want to be around me if I had them. I didn't know how to express them properly. I knew that it wouldn't be good to share them with just anyone, and frankly, I had a belief that I think is perpetuated in Christianity which says that if you are sad, somehow, you are less than a true Christian. Well, in my case, and I think in many cases, if you repress your sadness, than you will end up even more sad. It's as if it plugs up something in you, which prevents true joy from flowing.
     Yesterday when I was suffering a lot of physical pain, God ,it seems, used that to break down one of these dams I had built in my soul. When this dam was breached, sadness over something that happened 3 years ago began to flow. Because what happened was so painful at the time, I didn't want to face the full impact of it, so I put it under and out of the way. I did grieve slightly at the time, but not fully. So, when I was grieving yesterday with deep cries and expressing my thoughts to God over it, was when I realized the negative impact on my soul in pushing pain and heartache under. It doesn't work like we'd like it to.
     Many Christians are carrying loads of sadness in their souls due to this ineffective tactic of repressing it. Could that be also because we communicate to each other, albeit subconsciously, that if we have sadness that we are somehow less than a good Christian, even lacking faith? I think so.
     Knowing that Christ was a man of sorrows, acquainted with our grief, compels me to go to Him with all my sorrows as I experience them. Wouldn't it be good, if we could talk with one or two of our trusted fellow believers, and share with them too, and in doing so, could open them up to feel free to share likewise, so we could truly bear one another's burdens; to cry with each other? Then, I feel, our hearts could be truly knit together in a deep way instead of superficial ones.
     We need to risk being rejected, and be the one who steps out in this first in sharing, making ourselves vulnerable. Who knows, God may use it to bring His sweet balm of healing to both of our souls as we do. One thing we can be assured of is this: "Weeping may endure for the night, but joy comes in the morning."-Psalm 30:5.