I have this memory from my childhood that I think about every now and then, yet it still confuses me to an extent. Basically, what happened was I saw this scene of a cartoon character (I think the movie was called Cats Cant Dance?) leaving his hometown, and it caused me to have an intense breakdown (I don’t like this word but I cannot drum up a substitute). I watched probably a few minutes of this catman watching the world pass him by through a bus window, before I just started absolutely bawling my eyes out nonstop. I had to pause the movie (keep in mind this is one of the first scenes) just so I could lay down and continue crying. I curled up on the couch in a closed-off room, all by myself, and let everything out. And I didn’t want it to stop, it felt so fucking good. Like something was filling all of these crevices I did not know were embedded in my spirit. I was very young and had never experienced anything like that before; I didn’t even know why it happened. I remember thinking to myself how odd it was that I couldn’t stop crying, and the juxtaposition of feeling unknown tension release through something that I previously assumed to be a facet of negativity or irresponsible handling of personal affairs.

It serves a role almost as a centerpiece with which different periods of my life begin to make sense through. When the going gets rough, I sometimes randomly think of this crying spell that happened, and then I get the answers to what I was concerned about during whatever period of adulthood disregulation I was stuck in. Its like nothing makes sense for a while, and I can’t understand what I’m feeling other than that there’s a looming dread or discomfort with regards to whether or not I can survive any longer being who I am, but if I’m fortunate enough to touch base (and I can’t force it to come to mind) with this pure expression of emotions from my past, then for some reason I undergo a covert process that can rationalize the experience of being absorbed by this dreadful discomfort in the present. Oddly, every time this happens, I feel like I learn a little bit more about the childhood experience itself, and there’s a catharsis that stretches between the then, the now, and the future that allows me to trust the journey of feeling (that I unwillingly have participated in). Though up until earlier this day I couldn’t properly explain to you why this experience happened to me, now I think I might be able to give it a go, and I’m hoping that there are others who can relate and also desire to share their own versions of this odd thing.

My guess is that it is an early manifestation of extroverted feeling. And having gone through a lot of difficult situations at that young age, most of which I never really felt compelled to cry about or process through the lens of my own emotional lexicon, I was given my first chance at catharsis by living the feelings (of moving on, of something new and uncertain on the horizon, of change, of missing something, etc) of this character whose means of emotional expression was portrayed vividly utilizing movement, music, and other visuals. It’s not necessarily that I related to the character or his experience, its that I sensed he had something going on in his head that was blissful yet somber, and through Fe’s absorption of his state, I utilized that secondhand connectivity to process my own world of affairs.

Furthermore, it’s now almost like a mystic’s sphere that I unintentionally touch and receive conclusions from. The process goes: shit happens > confused about who i am and where I’m heading > worried about my future > random remembrance of childhood sobbing fit after months of frustration > oh maybe I’m not as fucked as I previously assumed. Ironically, this might be me using extroverted feeling to channel the emotions little me endured, so that current me can have a similar secondary source of emotional rationalization to then begin healing from the endless rumenations that flooded my subconscious. If my line of thinking isn’t misguided, I presume that the best way to process emotions as an INFJ might begin with externally connecting to somebody else’s intensive relationship with their emotions, and using that electric energy as a framework through which difficulties transition out from an internalized/unhealthy phase, into one that makes sense to the emotional component of survival. Like jump-starting a car, or transferring energy from one module to another, but for the purpose of processing trauma.