Dealing With Emotions

This past weekend I learned a valuable lesson about the need to learn how to deal with emotions in a healthy way. On Saturday, I was feeling a bit lonely and angry with someone who is very important in my life, and I dealt with it by masturbating. Of course this is not a constructive way to deal with these things, because it does nothing to solve the problem. But over the years I have learned to respond to negative emotions such as loneliness and anger by masturbating or acting out sexually in other ways.

So how can I deal with emotions like anger and loneliness in ways that are more constructive than masturbating? Well, I can blog about it here, which can provide a release, or start journaling, which my therapist has suggested. I can also talk about what I’m feeling with a friend. That’s been a little tricky for me though for several reasons: because I prefer that people do not know about my issues with same-sex attraction, and because being emotional is equated with being unmanly in my mind. I guess that’s something I need to get over as well.

Whatever I chose to do to express my emotions, I just need to be sure that it is healthy, and not something unhealthy like throwing things. I think the more I learn how to express my emotions in a healthy manner, the less I’ll be tempted to masturbate in order to deal with negative feelings.