You Are Not Too Much: Why Big Feelings Aren’t a Problem
Feeling too much?
Sometimes emotions sweep you up like Dorothy’s tornado and blow you straight to Oz. The chaos is surreal, disorienting—and it makes you lose your grounding, almost like forgetting who you are. It’s a deeply human experience. Onlookers may have no idea of the turbulence inside you and might label you as “too much” or “too sensitive.”
Like Dorothy, you may start to question your worth and power—and sometimes, you even believe it.
Reframing Emotional Intensity
Many people who feel “a lot” or feel deeply are often compassionate individuals with vivid, complex stories. These are the people with the emotional capacity of a 32 oz Big Gulp living in an 8 oz Red Solo Cup world.
Emotions aren’t malfunctions—they're messages. They tell you:
Something is happening in your environment
Something is affecting you
Something has affected you
Human emotion exists on a spectrum. Explosiveness happens. Despair happens. Numbing happens. So does joy, infatuation, awe, and horn—
...never mind that last one.
Why Big Emotions Happen
Nervous System Dysregulation
Trauma and chronic stress can dysregulate the nervous system, leading to intense emotional experiences.
A 2010 study by Nim Tottenham and Margaret Sheridan found that children exposed to early life stress or neglect showed increased activity in the brain’s fear center—the amygdala. Over time, this makes it harder to regulate emotion, even in safe environments.
Think of the amygdala like a smoke alarm that keeps going off—even when you’re just toasting bread.
Big emotions can be your body’s way of asking:
“Am I safe? Am I supported?”
Childhood Attachment Disruptions
A 2002 study by Megan Gunnar and Bonny Donzella found that prolonged maternal separation in children leads to chronic cortisol elevation, impairing the body’s ability to recover from stress.
This can show up later as:
Difficulty managing anger, guilt, grief, or shame
Low self-esteem
Fear of abandonment or rejection
Heightened sensitivity to social cues (tone of voice, facial expressions, body language)
That superhuman perceptiveness? It’s collecting a flood of emotional data—which can quickly become overwhelming and hard to regulate.
Neurobiological Sensitivity
Conditions like ADHD, Autism, Sensory Processing Disorder, PTSD, BPD, Bipolar Spectrum, and Depression can make emotional processing more intense.
If you live with one or more of these, your brain may be wired to notice, feel, and respond more strongly than others.
For example:
Depression in kids or teens often shows up as irritability, anger, and overwhelm, not sadness.
Sensory processing challenges can trigger panic, meltdown, or shut down.
Bipolar and mood disorders can make you feel on top of the world one day, and in the pit the next.
No matter the cause, it’s not a flaw—just a different rhythm.
How to Cope with Big Emotions
Practice Regulated Presence
Find something grounding—anything that helps your body notice the here and now.
Maybe it’s your dog’s fluffy belly (shout out to Jupiter). Maybe it’s cold water on your hands, or the smell of your favorite tea.
Use your senses:
What can you touch?
What can you see, hear, smell, taste?
Breathe slowly. Anchor to your surroundings. Repeat as needed.
Use Nonjudgmental Curiosity
Pause and say:
“I’m having a strong emotion.”
“It’s interesting that I feel this way right now.”
Avoid blame or shame. Ask:
What’s happening inside me?
What might this emotion be trying to show me?
What do I need right now?
Treat yourself as you would a dear friend.
If you wouldn’t shame them, don’t shame yourself.
“Of course I feel overwhelmed. I'm dealing with a lot.”
Validate Without Minimizing
Name your emotions.
Own your experience.
It’s okay to feel “inconvenient” things.
You don’t have to shrink or edit your feelings to make others more comfortable. Just show up with respect—for yourself and others.
Respect Boundaries and Autonomy
Working with intense emotion gets sticky. Know when to take a break and wash your hands.
Try:
“Can we pause and come back to this?”
“I need to decompress first.”
Or just: “No.” (Guilt not included.)
Allow for Silence and Slowness
Emotional healing isn’t instant. It’s like skin healing after a fall—it needs gentle space and time.
There will be moments when your Big Gulp overflows into cousin Todd’s shot glass. That’s okay. Let cousin Todd adjust his cup.
Final Thought
Feeling deeply is not failure. It’s not weakness. It’s evidence of your vivid inner world, your resilience, and your capacity to love, mourn, notice, protect, and grow.