This week at I Am Here, we’re asking: How Can We Embrace Emotional Complexity?
- What’s happening in our brain when emotions overlap?
- Why do we sometimes feel conflicting emotions at the same time?
- How can embracing emotional complexity help us grow and connect more deeply?
Life isn’t one-dimensional, and neither are our feelings. By learning to sit with emotional contradictions— for instance, joy alongside sadness, or anger alongside love—we enrich our lives, deepen our relationships, and grow in self-understanding.
What Are We Watching This Week?
We’re watching Ask a Therapist: How to Cope with Mixed Emotions, featuring Dr Rashida Dungarwalla, a registered psychologist with ReachOut Australia, who shares down-to-earth advice on navigating life’s mixed feelings.
Whether it’s starting a new job, going back to school, or grieving a loss, Rashida explains how we can hold space for both sadness and relief, or frustration and gratitude, without confusion or guilt.
Her practical guidance, that includes a Traffic Light system to aid manage emotions, helps us see mixed emotions not as a problem but as part of being human.
Watch the video clip (2-minute watch)
What Are We Reading This Week?
This week, we’re reading How Our Brain Navigates Conflicting Feelings from Psychology Today.
Emotions rarely come one at a time. They often blend—joy with sadness, relief with guilt—reflecting the uniqueness of our experiences.
Chemicals like dopamine and oxytocin help shape this complexity, influencing how we experience and express our emotions.
The article highlights that embracing emotional complexity isn’t weakness but wisdom.
By accepting the full spectrum of feelings, we gain deeper self-awareness and create more genuine connections with others.
Read the article (3-minute read)
Who Are We Quoting This Week?
“The ability to feel mixed emotions is a sign of maturity. Experienced together, opposing feelings tame each other. Once people develop the ability to feel different emotions at the same time, the world ripens into something richer and deeper.“
– Lindsay C. Gibson
At I Am Here, we believe embracing emotional complexity is part of emotional wellbeing. When we allow ourselves to feel contradictions without judgement, we grow in compassion for ourselves and others.