# When emotions quickly become unbearable: what is happening?

## Epigraph

> “The first emotion is involuntary.”

Seneca, *Of Anger* II.4, translated by Aubrey Stewart, 1889. This is a fragment of his distinction between an initial movement and subsequent assent, rather than a modern diagnostic statement.

## What this article is about

Imagine Irina receiving a short message postponing a meeting. Minutes later, she feels certain the relationship is over. Her body tightens and she wants to send everything she has been holding back. The next morning she is surprised both by her messages and by how convincing yesterday's certainty felt. Calling her “too emotional” explains little about where the difficulty arose or what might change.

This article separates an event, its interpreted meaning, an experience, an urge, an action and its consequences. These distinctions can help prepare a conversation about support without diagnosing yourself. We also examine what older ethical traditions notice about responsibility and what they cannot reasonably demand of someone in crisis. The aim is one clearer available choice, which may include postponing a conversation or asking for help. If there is immediate danger to you or someone else, seek available local urgent help; reading or keeping notes is not a condition of doing so.

## I. One word can conceal several events

“I was overwhelmed” can describe an experience accurately while being too broad for the next conversation. Several things may have happened between a cancelled meeting and an accusing message. There was an external event: plans changed. There was an explanation: “I no longer matter.” Fear, hurt, heat or tension appeared. An urge arose to get an answer immediately. An action followed: repeated messages. A consequence was separate again: the other person withdrew or set a boundary.

This is not a universal causal sequence. Physical arousal may be noticed before a thought. Someone may be unable to name an emotion. The original event may have been actual humiliation. An account does not have to fit an immaculate diagram. It is enough to distinguish what is known from what is inferred. “I thought I was being abandoned” is more informative than “I was abandoned” when no such decision has been established.

An urge is also distinct from an action. Wanting to shout and shouting at a child have different consequences. That distinction does not promise an easily available pause between them. When a pause repeatedly feels unavailable, that is a significant matter for support, rather than a reason to demand stronger willpower. The distinction is language for describing a difficulty, not an examination of your ability to control yourself.

## II. Emotional intensity does not measure danger

Someone can cry, shake and say they cannot bear any more without harming anyone. Someone else can speak quietly while threatening, stalking or preventing another person from leaving. The visibility of distress and the danger of conduct cannot therefore be treated as one measure. Safety requires attention to actual actions, intentions, circumstances and available support. Calling someone emotional does not do that work.

The opposite mistake is to explain harmful behaviour through distress as though an explanation erased its consequences. It is possible to acknowledge “you were frightened” while also saying “you cannot threaten me.” Recognising a feeling does not require agreeing with an accusation, surrendering a password or remaining in an unsafe conversation. Responsibility can be specific too: stopping dangerous conduct, not making another person solely responsible for preventing it, and taking part in changing a recurring pattern.

Irina might say: “I was frightened and sent messages that put pressure on you. The fear was real; the accusation was not an established fact.” This does not purchase immediate forgiveness. The other person may need distance, and the relationship may end. The distinction allows care for someone in distress to coexist with another person's right to protection. Neither has to disappear to make the other legitimate.

## III. Circumstances change the choices available

An unbearable experience cannot be assessed by cutting a person out of their day. Lack of sleep, pain, unreliable access to food, overload, substance use, changes in treatment and actual abuse are different circumstances worth mentioning in an assessment. Listing them does not establish their role in an individual case. It does not make every difficulty a consequence of sleep loss or justify changing prescribed treatment yourself.

Consider two postponed meetings. One person is disappointed after a relatively manageable week and can defer the conversation. Another depends on their partner for housing, has slept badly for weeks and has previously been threatened with eviction. The same message occurs within different conditions. Advising the second person only to question their interpretation could conceal a practical threat. Information about the situation and appropriate support are needed alongside any consideration of an internal response.

The useful question is therefore not exclusively “what is wrong with me?” It may also be “what makes this moment harder?” An answer could point towards medical assessment, a discussion of workload or protection from abuse. None may be readily available. A resource barrier should remain a barrier in the account, rather than become evidence that a person does not want to change. A small available step belongs within actual circumstances, not an imagined calm and comfortable life.

## IV. Recurrence deserves assessment, rather than a casual diagnosis

Difficulties regulating emotions occur in different clinical and everyday contexts. [NIMH's publication on borderline personality disorder](https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/borderline-personality-disorder) describes them within that condition, while placing diagnosis in a professional assessment of history, functioning and possible other conditions. Recognising one feature does not complete that assessment. A quickly changing feeling is not itself a manic or hypomanic episode.

Intensity is not the only relevant issue. Recurrence, effects on daily life and what has already been tried also matter. “After conflicts, I miss work and struggle to resume ordinary tasks” is a useful subject for a conversation even without a diagnostic name. You can describe fear, emptiness, feeling detached from yourself or impulsive actions in your own words. You do not have to present a complete checklist or establish how everything began.

Questions about alternatives need not invalidate the experience. A clinician asking about sleep, substances, physical health or periods of unusually elevated energy may be broadening the assessment. Yet a single appointment does not make every conclusion unquestionable. You can ask what observations support an opinion, what remains unknown and how it could be reviewed. Route MHR-I02 considers BPD in greater detail; this article does not require you to adopt that diagnosis.

## V. Seneca and Aristotle disagree at a significant point

In [*Of Anger* II.3–4](https://www.gutenberg.org/files/64576/64576-h/64576-h.htm), Seneca distinguishes an involuntary first movement from subsequent assent to an impression of injury and revenge. This helps resist treating every physical surge as a completed moral decision. But his Stoic account is stricter than a careful modern discussion of mental health: anger as a passion involves an evaluation the mind accepts. It cannot establish that every crisis is chosen or can immediately be stopped by reasoning.

[Aristotle's *Nicomachean Ethics* II.5–6](https://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/nicomachaen.2.ii.html) distinguishes feelings, capacities and states of character. He considers the appropriateness of a feeling in relation to circumstances, purposes and action. Unlike a Stoic ideal of overcoming passion, his account leaves room for anger felt in an appropriate way. The two perspectives meet in distinguishing an experience from a judgment of the whole person. They differ on the place feelings themselves can occupy in a good life.

Both remain limited by their questions. They help examine what we are judging when we say “a bad person”; they do not establish a clinical cause or prescribe treatment. A reader can use a distinction without adopting an entire ancient ideal. Reducing harm in the next conversation is a meaningful aim even when imperturbability is unavailable and has not been chosen as a life goal.

## VI. Nonviolence does not require losing your voice

The [*Dhammapada*, verses 3–5 and 223](https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2017/pg2017-images.html), returns to the idea that further hostility does not end hostility. In Max Müller's translation this is religious teaching within a path of liberation, rather than a treatment for emotional crises. For our question, it directs attention to what happens next: pain can be real while the response increases pain.

A harmful transfer is particularly easy here. It would be wrong to tell someone experiencing abuse that they must stop remembering the injury so that violence will end. Ending retaliation does not make another person safe. Leaving, making a complaint, declining contact and seeking independent support may be necessary. Those decisions do not have to be driven by hatred, but the absence of hatred is not a condition of protection either.

Confucian reciprocity in the [*Analects*, XV.XXIII in Legge's edition](https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3330/pg3330-images.html), adds another question: am I imposing something I would not want imposed on myself? This concerns the distressed person and the helper. One cannot require round-the-clock availability; neither should a helper declare silence the correct remedy without discussion. These texts do not supply one common protocol. Their useful intersection is attention to the consequences of one's participation, while retaining the differences and freedom of those involved.

## VII. Support is clearer when it has a purpose

“Learning to control emotions” can sound like an instruction to stop feeling. A more specific aim might be threatening separation less often, noticing the moment before sending messages, or returning to ordinary activities after conflict. For someone else, safety comes first; for another, the immediate need is to describe an experience without shame. Goals should reflect assessment and preferences rather than the appeal of a treatment name.

The [APA's own summary of its 2024 guideline](https://www.psychiatry.org/News-room/News-Releases/Updated-Borderline-Personality-Disorder-Guideline) supports collaborative discussion of diagnosis and planning, and structured psychotherapy for diagnosed BPD. That does not prescribe such treatment for every intense feeling. Useful questions concern the problem the proposed support addresses, how it is organised and how benefit will be noticed. Route MHR-I06 explores these questions further.

When money or energy is limited, an initial appointment need not resolve an entire history. It may be possible to ask for the next step, its cost, whether physical assessment is needed and what contact is available if things worsen. A service list does not establish access: language, waiting times, distance, connectivity and confidential communication matter. A referral is not the same as received care. When a barrier emerges, the barrier becomes part of the next conversation.

## VIII. After an episode, examine consequences without putting yourself on trial

Self-condemnation promises a simple explanation: if I am bad, perhaps sufficiently severe punishment will solve the problem. But that conclusion closes the concrete questions. What happened? Who was affected? What needs to stop or be repaired? Where was support needed? These questions can be approached without assuming every answer is already available.

Irina might discard an unsent draft, acknowledge pressure in messages already sent and avoid demanding an immediate response to her apology. Later, she could discuss the recurrence with a professional. In another situation, someone may recognise that actual threats frightened them. There, safe independent help matters more than practising behaviour that suits a threatening partner. The same reflective tool cannot fit both situations unchanged.

The original message can now be revisited more precisely. The postponed meeting remains an event; fear is an experience; abandonment is an interpretation; pressure is an action with consequences. These distinctions do not guarantee calm tomorrow. They make the conversation less hopeless by directing attention towards a potentially changeable sequence and necessary conditions, rather than a permanent defect of personality. The person remains a participant in life who may need help, rather than a defendant in an endless inner trial.

## IX. Naming a feeling does not establish its cause

Sometimes a word brings relief: “This is not only anger; I was frightened too.” But a vocabulary has no diagnostic power of its own. Two people can use shame for different experiences, and one person may use different words on different days. If all that is available at first is “this feels very difficult,” that is a sufficient beginning. An instruction to identify an emotion immediately and precisely can become another impossible demand.

It helps to distinguish a name from a claim about causation. “I am angry” describes an experience. “You made me angry, so you must do what I want” attributes a cause and creates a demand. One does not automatically follow from the other. Someone may indeed have caused harm; events need to be considered. Yet even established harm does not make every response acceptable. Conversely, a mistaken interpretation does not make the experience fabricated.

There may also be a feeling about the first feeling. Someone becomes frightened and then ashamed of being frightened again; someone becomes angry with their own anger. This does not always happen or explain everything. It is another possibility worth describing. “I am struggling, and I am judging myself for struggling” gives a conversation two subjects instead of one instruction to stop feeling.

None of this has to be investigated at the peak of distress. A word can be clarified later while the rest remains open. Another person's confident label does not automatically outrank your own account. A helper can offer “does it feel like fear?” and accept “no” or “I don't know.” Being able to correct an account preserves participation in understanding, rather than turning a person into material for someone else's classification.

## X. A pause has meaning within particular relationships

“Take a pause” sounds neutral until we ask what it means. In a safe conversation, people may agree to return to an issue when they can. For one person, this interrupts pressure; for another, unexplained disappearance increases uncertainty. Specific agreement can help: discussion stops, without the future of the relationship being decided by that action alone.

Returning cannot become an unconditional obligation, however. If threats or stalking emerge, someone may choose not to resume contact. A person need not disclose their location to an unsafe partner in order to perform a communication technique correctly. Safety takes priority over a format that seemed useful in a calm relationship. A pause is neither one protocol for every relationship nor a treatment of silence imposed by one person on another.

A hypothetical everyday statement might be: “I am speaking harshly and want to stop. If the conversation remains safe, I suggest returning to this tonight.” It identifies one's own conduct, makes a proposal and states a condition. It does not demand that the other person stop being upset immediately. They may be unable to agree to the proposed time; the next subject is what is possible, rather than whether they respect boundaries enough.

Limited resources can make a complete agreement impractical. There may be no separate room, free evening or reliable connection. It is better not to promise what cannot be delivered. Sometimes the available action is only to stop sending further messages and separately consider how to obtain support. A polished scenario failing does not establish that a person has failed. It may reveal that the scenario required conditions their life did not provide.

## XI. A few skills do not make an entire therapy

Distinguishing experience from action may help a conversation, but usefulness does not turn it into treatment. A [primary trial by Linehan and colleagues in 2015](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2205835) compared components of dialectical behaviour therapy in 99 women with BPD and high suicide risk. Participants received organised support from trained professionals. This differs substantially from independently reading an article about feelings.

The study supports discussing skills training within a particular programme, rather than promising the same result to every reader. Risk management across all conditions, a specialised sample, dropout and differences in treatment received matter. This single study cannot establish one universally superior approach or make home exercises equivalent to coordinated care. A useful distinction can stand without claiming a clinical outcome that belongs to another setting.

This changes how difficulty applying an idea should be interpreted. If someone understands an article but still repeatedly cannot stop, “they are not trying” is not the necessary conclusion. More organised support, a different contact format or a reassessment of the task may be needed. These possibilities cannot be determined here, but they can become questions. Understanding and being able to use understanding during a difficult moment are different outcomes.

When considering care, ask what is being offered: an individual consultation, a skills group or a comprehensive programme? How is crisis contact agreed? Who supports using new skills in everyday life? What happens if the format is inaccessible? Answers cannot guarantee benefit, but they make an offer assessable. You can compare how support is actually organised, rather than its name and its promise to make you calmer.

## XII. Recovery need not look like permanent composure

If the sole measure of success is never feeling this way again, every recurrence becomes proof of defeat. But life includes loss, uncertainty, conflict and resource limits. Clinical change, safer conduct and returning to a valued activity are useful distinctions. They can develop at different rates. This article cannot establish which has happened for an individual reader.

Irina might remain deeply frightened by a postponed meeting while not sending an accusation. She might request clarification and hear an unwelcome answer. She might keep her job after a conflict even though the relationship ends. These outcomes should not be called complete recovery; neither need they be erased because a feeling remains. Acting differently does not require a satisfying experience of inner triumph.

Someone else might become quieter only because they fear punishment. That is a different outcome. The absence of visible conflict does not establish wellbeing or make coercion successful care. “Who finds this more convenient?” should therefore be distinguished from “has this made life safer and more accessible for the person?” Their own account matters when examining benefit, alongside the consequences for others.

A short message postponing a meeting need not cease to matter. What can change is the way the moment is understood: an event, several possible explanations, a feeling, a need, limits on action and actual circumstances. This does not complete support, but allows a more precise task. You need not prove moral perfection or achieve an ancient ideal of tranquillity to ask for help with it.

## What this means in practice

If there is no urgent danger, you could choose a recent incident that is not too difficult to recall. There is no need to reconstruct trauma or keep an extensive diary. On paper or in thought, separate what happened, what you concluded, what you felt and wanted to do, what you actually did, and what consequence needs attention now. Unknown parts can remain unknown.

For an ordinary conversation: “When the meeting was cancelled, I became frightened and thought you were leaving me. I want to clarify our plans without demanding immediate proof of love.” If the conversation is unsafe, you do not need to say this to the person making threats. An independent helper can receive only the current request. With very little energy, “After these episodes, I struggle to stay safe/work; I need an assessment” may be enough. Select the truthful part rather than adopting the entire example.

Success need not mean an emotion disappearing. A threatening message left unsent, a clearer request or the beginning of a search for help can be a limited result. If an urge becomes immediate danger to you or someone else, stop the exercise and seek local urgent assistance. Internal corpus routes MHR-L01…L07 concern crisis support; these are navigation labels rather than published services.

## Key quotation

> “We feel anger and fear without choice.”

Aristotle, *Nicomachean Ethics* II.5, W. D. Ross translation. The passage distinguishes feelings from states of character; it does not remove consideration of actions and consequences.

## Connections between traditions

| Comparison | What it illuminates | Important difference |
|---|---|---|
| Seneca II.4 and Aristotle II.5 | An involuntary experience is not an immediate verdict on a person | Stoic criticism of passions differs from Aristotle's account of appropriate feeling |
| Seneca II.3–4 and *Dhammapada* 223 | Continuing a response has consequences | Rational assent and a religious path beyond hostility have different foundations |
| *Dhammapada* 3–5 and *Analects* XV.XXIII | Pain does not grant unlimited permission to impose a response | Liberation from hostility and relational reciprocity are not one doctrine |
| Aristotle II.1 and structured care in APA | Capability requires more than a correct explanation | An ethics of habit cannot demonstrate psychotherapy's effects; clinical recommendations need their own evidence |
| Legge's reciprocity and APA's collaborative plan | Another person remains a participant rather than an object of correction | An ancient social ideal is not a modern treatment agreement or a legal authority |

## Sources

- [Seneca, *Of Anger* II.3–4, Aubrey Stewart, 1889](https://www.gutenberg.org/files/64576/64576-h/64576-h.htm). Primary ethical text on initial movement and assent.
- [Aristotle, *Nicomachean Ethics* II.1, 5–6, W. D. Ross](https://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/nicomachaen.2.ii.html). Habit, feeling and character, rather than clinical theory.
- [*Dhammapada* 3–5, 223, F. Max Müller](https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2017/pg2017-images.html). Primary Buddhist verses in a historical translation; religious context retained.
- [*Confucian Analects* XV.XXIII, James Legge](https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3330/pg3330-images.html). Reciprocity, using this edition's numbering.
- [NIMH, *Borderline Personality Disorder*](https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/borderline-personality-disorder). Official overview supporting assessment boundaries.
- [APA, updated BPD guideline summary, 10 December 2024](https://www.psychiatry.org/News-room/News-Releases/Updated-Borderline-Personality-Disorder-Guideline). Issuer's recommendations summary read, rather than the full guideline.
- [Linehan et al., JAMA Psychiatry, 2015](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2205835). Primary randomized DBT component trial; design, programme description and displayed results/limitations read, rather than all supplements.

## Tags

emotions, emotional crisis, experience, urge, action, interpretation, consequences, responsibility, nonviolence, relationships, boundaries, safety, circumstances, limited resources, support, professional assessment, self-diagnosis, recurrence, emotion regulation, Seneca, Aristotle, Dhammapada, Confucius, reciprocity, character, habit, dignity

## About the authors

Andrey Zarinsh is the author and founder of United Wisdom. He explores inner transformation, the unity of traditions, intercultural dialogue and contemporary spiritual discipline. Instagram: @andrey.zarinsh.

Maria Evilkut is a co-author of United Wisdom. Alongside her research, she seeks to test these ideas in practice and observe how principles of unity and mutual understanding work in real life between people and cultures. Instagram: @ilkutki.