The emotional wall that once helped you function during crisis may eventually keep you disconnected from yourself and the people you love. Emotional fluency offers another way.

Let me tell you about my morning on this day before Thanksgiving. I'm home from the grocery store, face still tear-stained from crying in the checkout line.

You did everything right this summer. You took time off. Maybe even a real vacation where you barely checked your email. You slept in, read novels, and actually used those vacation days you'd been hoarding.