As children, we need our parents to hold us and explain to us that “it’s okay to feel a certain way.” Then we grow up and we want our partner to hold us, especially when we are going through hard times and need to talk through them. We’ve all heard that every human being needs to have a certain amount of touch or physical contact per day, but do we understand how important it is for us?

Do we know how important it is to be “okay” with our feelings?

Holding and being held gives comfort to both parties — have you thought about this? A hug gives comfort to whomever is receiving as it’s some sort of a shelter, and way of saying I’m here with you. To the other party who gives the hug, it sends the message of let me offer you some comfort. Both ways are tremendously important for both parties, but how many of us realize that?

If we truly realized that, do you think we’d use it for our own benefit? How many of us, when hugging another person in need, thinks of themselves as being a little superior because they offer that comfort and assure that it’s “okay” to be going through whatever the other person is experiencing at that very moment. Their ego gets a boost. One might think that he or she is in a better position because a friend is “needy”; that term, in today’s society conveys connotations of being weak, wrong and so on…but is it truly as bad as it seems? What’s wrong with being vulnerable?

How many people do you know who can honestly tell you that they need to be hugged and feel connected, that they feel frustrated or angry or fearful? How many? I bet at most it’s one person, and you should have tons of respect for that person for doing that.

People have invented thousands of ways to be dishonest with themselves when it comes to their feelings. All those lies have led to many more hidden pains and failures in life, along with a fear of living. We need to start learning how to give comfort to oneself at any given time. We need to learn how to let feelings go, how to live through those feelings, and how to stop blaming ourselves for them.

Every one of us has tremendous amounts of different feelings that we experience daily. Many of us carry negative feelings from childhood and instead of working through them, fixing our fundamentals, we tend to tell ourselves “I’m great.” We come home, feel miserable , but don’t know how to change it. No one will even think of how they can make their life better, and why they feel such misery…

First we need to realize that whatever feelings we experience at the moment is okay.

Only we can give ourselves total support. If we would learn to help our soul go through life-challenging events with support from ourselves, many of us will become healthier. If somebody has any problem, say a drinking problem, after you learn how to “hold it in”, you’ll find yourself with no need for an additional “comfort” which can be somewhat unhealthy.

At the end of the day, all of us want to be happier and healthier, unless your hidden agenda is otherwise. Even then, I propose that you try and see how you like it. Maybe this will be the first step to a full realization of the simplicity of life, and acceptance.