When Staying Busy Becomes Emotionally Harmful
- Devan Briggs
- May 28
- 3 min read
The world today is very busy. There are a million things to do including chores, work, hobbies, spending time with family and friends, taking care of ourselves, and taking care of others. While we often have a lot of responsibilities, there are always times we can take for ourselves. What we do with our time makes a big difference in our ability to emotionally regulate, focus, and be mindful.
With so many distractions and screens, it is easy to constantly find something to stare at, scroll through, and keep our minds occupied. While many of us might do these things out of habit, there is also an overlap of people who consciously or unconsciously stay busy in order to feel productive, feel worthwhile, and avoid uncomfortable feelings. If I keep my schedule loaded, I won't have to notice how sad I'm feeling. If I'm constantly busy, I won't realize how lonely I feel. If I keep moving, others will be impressed by how much I get done and I will feel worthy. Keeping ourselves busy, using screens or otherwise, is a negative coping mechanism that we use to help us avoid our uncomfortable feelings.
Being able to be present with our own feelings and experience them in way where we aren't judging or trying to change them is infinitely difficult. Many of the feelings we experience or things we think about on a day to day basis can be very uncomfortable to endure. Human beings have a lot of different tips and tricks we do to try to avoid these thoughts or feelings such as endlessly scrolling, over and under eating, binge watching t.v, focusing on others, and anything that helps us numb out. Staying constantly busy can look like engaging in some of the aforementioned behaviors, as well as overworking, over-scheduling, care-taking, and so many other things.
Not allowing ourselves to experience our feelings leads them to build up and for us to become emotionally dysregulated. Our nervous system goes haywire as we aren't allowing any kind of rest, slowing down, or processing. Everything feels harder and more effortful, and we become overwhelmed easily. We also start to lose our sense of wants, needs, and creativity as we have little space to reflect and check in with ourselves.
Being intentional with our time is how we can start releasing ourself from a cycle of going from one thing to the next. An important first step is carving out free time. Whether that means reassessing how busy you are making yourself or asking someone else to help, you deserve and need free time. Next is to think about starting an activity that actually brings us joy and isn't just mindless or habitual. A lot of people don't have hobbies or interests because they have gotten used to mindlessly scrolling or keeping themselves busy that they don't have time to start them. Find something that is enjoyable, meaningful, and fun.
The next step is knowing when to use those interests and hobbies and when to feel our feelings. Even our interests and hobbies can become another thing we turn to for avoiding or numbing. Make sure to engage in hobbies and interests when it actually sounds fun, and not to avoid uncomfortable feelings. If you are experiencing big feelings, put a timer on for three minutes. Taking that pause to fully be present with what you are experiencing can be helpful in you breaking the cycle of keeping yourself busy and avoiding.
Over time you will get better at sitting with uncomfortable feelings and not reaching for something right away to avoid or numb. You may figure out new ways to process your feelings like journaling, talking to a trusted person, or using art. You will also probably find that you become more creative, feel less stressed, learn about yourself, and enjoy things more fully. This is a new habit that you will have to practice every day. There may be some days where it just doesn't feel accessible and you turn to avoiding behaviors to deal. That's okay. We're not perfect. If you can be aware of your feelings and behaviors and be intentional with what you do with them most of the time, that's all we can ask of ourselves.
Written by Devan of SafeHeart Counseling. Devan is the founder and owner of SafeHeart Counseling, which provides therapy services to children, teens, and young adults. SafeHeart Counseling specializes in working with eating disorders, trauma, and anxiety.
Comments