When I was going through a difficult time, one of my friends told me she had been praying for me to "feel everything." I can't word for word remember her exact explanation so below is a mixture of what she said combined with what I believe.

• "Feeling everything" is part of the human experience, it's a very natural thing. Just like we feel happy, we can feel depressed. It's not bad nor good, it just is.
• More importantly, I strongly believe that to get over something you need to feel it all- cry, get mad, cry, deny, replay, whatever otherwise it remains in your system. I've watched a few interviews of Gabor Maté and am sold on his idea that a lot of unprocessed trauma can manifest into physical illness. Some people can get over things really quickly, and sometimes I doubt that they are actually "over it." People might distract themselves, "go for a holiday", pick up new hobbies but this can just be like wrapping their trauma, just added a layer on top but it still remains. Alot of times, when you face things head on, the discomfort can make you want to crawl into a hole but in my experience, it has always been worthwhile. Any form of fear I have left "unprocessed" generally has gathered momentum over the years and become an even bigger fear than it actually is. It is like a boulder rolling down a mountain, becoming larger, gathering momentum and dust as it comes down. When you see things for what they are, you don't add it, you don't subtract. You just acknowledge the facts, so "this happened" and over time you learn to let go. Finally, time really can heal all wounds (so cliché, I know! I start to see more of the truth in clichés as I get older).