what really touched me in Inside Out 2

on emotions, anxiety and self-esteem ❤️‍🩹

*spoiler alert

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today I went to see Inside Out 2, guess I don’t have to say much about it since it’s all over the Internet recently. I didn’t read any reviews nor watch the trailer of Inside Out 2 since it came out. plus, I barely remember what happened on the first version which was released 9 years ago (just that it was really good), and I even got in the movie 10 minutes late (:sad face:)

usually I won’t be able to tell you again what happened exactly in the movie, what was the storyline or who were all the characters, etc. yet Inside Out 2 made it to my mind by registering such strong emotions while I was watching it.

I cried multiple times, and God knows for what reasons.

Follows Riley, in her teenage years, encountering new emotions - IMDb

Riley’s life seems simple.

she’s a kid with a good heart who loves playing hockey and hanging out with her friends. they go to a hockey camp together and that’s where the dramas happen, when she finally meets her coolest hockey role model and wants to step into a new circle where everyone seems more mature, more “adult”, more modern and more exclusive. the camp involves different situations when Riley needs to make decisions and she goes through a bunch of emotions while in the back, all the emotions are fighting each other to earn a slot to take control of her.

I just didn’t view Inside Out 2 like a typical coming-of-age or American teen kind of movies cuz it didn’t feel like so.

Riley was going through such a hard time with complex emotions at the age of 13, yet the emotions were so relatable that I bet any of us would also see ourselves in those.

with Inside Out 1, we were introduced to 5 core emotions of Riley including Joy, Sadness, Fear, Disgust and Anger. then in Inside Out 2, Anxiety came in, and she didn’t just come alone. Anxiety was there with Envy, Ennui, and Embarrassment; in which a lot of time Anxiety was a dominant character that drove Riley’s difficult decisions and was responsible for making things go South.

aren’t we people experiencing the same thing sometimes?

there’s a thin line between the two narrative we tell ourselves, like Riley does, from “I’m a good person” to “I’m not good enough”.

when our self-esteem is low, we tend to see the worst in us, which pushes us to force things to happen to prove others that we’re worth of something.

it’s like how Riley shifted her focus from enjoying the camp with the last time playing as a team with her best friends into how to win a position in her hockey coach’s heart to be chosen and how to fit in a group of cool-&-mature high-school girl group so that she won’t be left out when she transitions.

or like how we forget what’s truly in us and chasing what’s not. a successful career that other people talk about. a goal that truly does not fit our dreams. a character development born just to fit into your partner’s ideal images.

sounds familiar?

our Anxiety was never fully wrong, guess it were just trying to tell us something that we had not known of yet. guess it just didn’t tell the full version of the story.

our Joy sometimes tried to hide or even erase the bad memories we had, for a good cause, just like Riley’s Joy.

aren’t you worried that bad memories coming back would form bad beliefs?

I remember Joy being asked when pulling out bad memories were the only solution that could help them come back to the emotion headquarter.

but the belief we have for ourselves should be much more than that, if we look deeply into it.

the more we understand and accept ourselves as a whole, the more we love ourselves and have a higher self-esteem, the more we believe in ourselves and the world around us.

we love her, every messy, beautiful piece of her.

neither Anxiety nor Joy could decide how Riley would become, or which sense of self fits her the most, left alone all other emotions and contexts and past stories.

when Riley’s sense of self object suddenly transforms within all different versions. the good. the bad. the ugly. and the all unites into one, that’s what Riley truly is, and that her emotions are there rooting for it.

our emotions are what’s inside our head(quarters), day and night, consciously and unconsciously. sometimes they help us express what’s going on, sometimes they prevent us from taking the right action, sometimes they cost us making stupid decision or saying things that hurt others. but they are always ours.

the more we listen and acknowledge our emotions, the better we can regulate those.

the more we regulate those. the more mindful we are about our sense of self. the stronger our self-esteem holds us.

just remember that "you're not defined by just one emotion."

honestly yours,

Han from work in progress

A work-in-progress of a dedicated thinker. Here I share about work, life and how I learn to embrace myself day by day. Hope it helps! 🌷

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