Charlie Sheen’s Exploding Emotional Jug
Summary
Tiger blood appears to be no antidote for Charlie Sheen’s exploding emotional jug. After going after Jon Cryer, the prime time to Twitter time actor now popularly known as @charliesheen could use some help emptying his emotional jug.
“Jon has not called me. He’s a turncoat, a traitor, a troll. Is it gonna take me calling him a ‘traitor, juvenile and scared’ for him to get it?”
~ Charlie Sheen
by Lauren DelGandio
After seeing explosive tantrums directed at Chuck Lorre, his one-time friend, colleague and creator of Two and a Half Men, didn’t get Charlie Sheen much more than headlines and a pink slip from CBS present Les Moonves, the prime time to Twitter time crossover is now taking aim at another former friend, Two and a Half Men co-star Jon Cryer.
“Jon has not called me,” Charlie Sheen told E! Online yesterday. “He’s a turncoat, a traitor, a troll. Is it gonna take me calling him a ‘traitor, juvenile and scared’ for him to get it?”
Regardless of how much “tiger blood” the former hit comedy star is drinking, Charlie Sheen’s actions say he’s more like everyone else than he may have suspected. Albeit with a much bigger microphone now that he’s fast approaching a new world record with more than 2.3 million Twitter followers and becoming popularly known as @charliesheen.
Even for @charliesheen, tiger blood doesn’t appear to be an antidote for intense feelings that can leak out in name calling, labeling, taunting, stonewalling and other typical dirty fighting tactics before ultimately either imploding or exploding.
Related: Listening with Empathy
While the symptoms of someone holding in negative emotions may first touch the people closest, it’s the people exploding or imploding who often pay the highest price.
Strong feelings held inside can quickly lead to sadness, depression or physically self-destructive acts. Those who explode outwardly will be seen as angry, raging, and at the extreme, abusive and violent towards others.
That’s not a safe place to be, as “others” are usually the people closest, such as family members, neighbors, classmates, or co-workers.
Who hasn’t seen someone huffing and puffing around the house, school, office or shopping mall with a short fuse just waiting to ignite?
It’s hard to imagine anytime in the past when someone in the midst of exploding their emotional jug had such a large audience.
As Charlie Sheen has talked about very openly, it’s not unusual for people to turn to drugs (legal and illegal) to mask the symptoms of strong feelings. The result is often that what could have been a brief, painful, passing experience instead becomes suffering that can destroy lives and human potential.
Related: Psychiatrists Increasingly Turn to Drug Therapy
A valuable lesson from marriage education is understanding that feelings of pain, anger, sadness, frustration and disappointment eventually either explode inside or outside. That can be tragic when someone doesn’t have a way to release all that energy without hurting themselves or others. The good news is that it’s not difficult to learn. The bad news is that most people don’t know how.
That’s one of the problems with this week’s report that most psychiatrists are now promoting drug therapy instead of listening to their patients and helping them learn to safely release strong feelings instead of covering them up.
While it would be easy for people on the receiving end of Charlie Sheen’s continuous public tirade to feel angry, betrayed, and disappointed, finding compassion for Charlie Sheen, ourselves, and others is a more lasting gift.