Relieved
Feeling relieved means feeling lighter because a worry, task or danger has passed. The test came back clear. The deadline is met. The plane landed, and you can put down something you'd been carrying.
- On the wheel: Calm, then relieved
- More exact words: Lighter, reassured
- Nearby: Content, safe, and dreading before it
- Often points to: Something you were carrying that you can put down
Sitting in the car before you can drive
The body often gets the news first: a long breath out, shoulders that drop an inch, and sometimes a laugh or tears you didn't see coming.
Two closer words on the wheel split it. Lighter is about weight, in your mood or in what you still have to do, and reassured is about information: something you learned, or something someone said, takes the worry away.
"The doctor said, 'It's nothing serious.' I said thank you, walked to the car and sat there for five minutes before I could drive."
The more you dreaded it, the better it can feel
Relief only exists because you expected something bad.1 When 18 volunteers lay in a brain scanner waiting for pain that then didn't come, their brains registered the relief as a reward.1
The people who felt more dread beforehand, or who scored as more pessimistic, rated that relief as more pleasant.1
So the size of your relief can be a rough measure of how much you were carrying, on top of how good the news is.
Relief that keeps the fear alive
Relief has a catch. Psychologists think it may be one reason avoidance sticks: you cancel the scary call, relief floods in, and the relief makes canceling more likely next time.2
A lab study tested this by teaching people an action that cancelled an unpleasant stimulus.3 Most people's relief shrank each time nothing bad happened. Not everyone's. People who scored low on tolerating distress kept feeling strong relief, which the researchers suggest may over-reward avoidance.3
Ask where yours came from. If it's over because you did the hard thing, or the danger passed, the relief is earned. If you got out of it and the thing is still waiting for you, read dread and anxious.
"Thank goodness" points backward
Relief always looks back at a worry. Calm doesn't need one first; it sounds like "nothing needs me right now." Happy is the good news itself, where relief is the bad news ending.
Four things to do while it's fresh
- Let your body finish. Take a slow breath with a long breath out. The tension from waiting can take a while to leave after the news does.
- Name what you were carrying. Write it in one line, and how long you carried it.
- Check the source. If the relief came from avoiding something, write the smallest next step toward it.
- Write down what the worry got wrong. If you forecast a bad outcome and it didn't come, put the forecast and the result side by side. The next worry will want to forget it.
What were you carrying before this relief came, and how long had you carried it? Write what you thought would happen, and what happened instead.
Answer this with JoyQuestions people ask about feeling relieved
What is the meaning of relieved?
No longer worried or burdened, because something difficult ended or a feared outcome didn't happen. "I was relieved to hear she got home safely."
Is it relieved or relief?
Relief is the noun, the feeling itself: "What a relief." Relieved is the adjective, how you feel: "I'm so relieved."
Why do I cry when I'm relieved?
Tears can come with any strong feeling, and the end of a long stretch of fear is a strong one. Crying at good news can mean the waiting was harder than you let yourself feel while it lasted.
Related
- Calm: the core feeling relief sits inside.
- Dread: the feeling that often comes before relief.
- Contentment: calm that doesn't need a worry first.