However, I can't deny the fact that I still have storms of intense emotions. It gets triggered and I just have to wait it out. It doesn't affect me externally too much any more because I know it will pass. Although I will complain somewhere and write out my thoughts, I try to collect myself together.
I know I am looping, and I know I am able to make the conscious decision to step out of it. I no longer feel helpless in emotions.
Exactly.
I hadn't had an "episode" in three years, and suddenly I had one just this past summer. I remember it vividly precisely because it had become something that I no longer experienced. It was weird to experience it again. And like you said, the more I told myself to get out of my head and "just stop thinking about that", the more my brain was consuming itself. What I did that night was cry for 1 hour. Literally that's all it took. If I had allowed myself to just fucking cry and let it all out, I would've saved myself a lot of time. And after that, I wrote 20 pages in my diary dissecting what had just happened and my own feelings, and I just understood my own psyche so much better, I understood the root of my reaction, and how it had nothing to do with the girl who hurt me, it had everything to do with past memories of my own self-worth. I think that self-analysis and profound understanding of oneself is key to becoming stable. Once you understand something and truly integrate it, it dissolves either forever or for many years to come.
I just have this unbreakable knowing that all my emotions are temporary, and that everything will pass, even the most horrific thing will pass. I didn't have this knowing in the past. I had to learn it.
So I stay in that perspective, and knowing with absolute certainty that it will end is what makes me stay well when I'm under high stress. I can feel my emotions as the rawest hurricane, and I can feel how much and deep I hurt sometimes, it's not like I became numb or unaffected by life; but it's the way of handling and managing it all that becomes effective, you learn the system that works best for you to manage your inner world, and you stick to that system and it goes well. If it needs tweaking, you tweak it. But it's under control, because you understand it like the palm of your hand.
If I had to give any advice... I can only say don't freak out if the INFP in question cries or something xD People get really weird with displays of negative emotion, particularly sadness or frustration. Anger seems to be more socially accepted. Having my emotions spill all over the floor after trying really hard to contain them, I don't like it. Being witnessed is an unpleasant feeling. But it's even worse if the person who is witnessing is distressed by me. They should be calm and be like "oh no problem, you wanna talk or something".
I have an ENTP family member and I love him to the Underworld and back, and I'm trying to imagine what it would be like if I expressed sadness, or cry-ness in front of him. The only things I express to him are positive emotions and anger. I would feel extremely uncomfortable and stupid expressing lower emotions, even though I know he loves me. I would need him to be silent, not resort to any joke, just be quiet and ask what happened, be a listening ear. This situation has never happened though, so I have no idea if he is capable of such a thing.
Now, OP you speak of how your INFPs are having constant lows. Oh man, I wouldn't be a listening ear to anyone who is constantly in a low. Just because interacting with them affects me too much, and I have zero desire to "save" people. I'd rather save myself. But maybe you're different, I don't know. So... I'm only speaking of a situation where having to put up with a sad person is a special occasion, not something regular and draining.
