cathartic release
Cleansing emotional outpour
Cathartic release is the emotional discharge that comes from expressing or confronting intense feelings—grief, anger, fear.
The phrase often appears in discussions of therapy, art, or physical exertion as outlets for pent-up emotion: Screaming into a pillow provided a cathartic release, The film offered viewers a cathartic release.
Sometimes shortened to just catharsis.
- cryingEmotional tear release
- good cryEmotionally healing weeping session
- ugly cryingUncontrolled, unflattering sobbing
- purgingForcible elimination of unwanted
- laughingMaking sounds of amusement
screaming · primal scream · shouting · healing · sobbing · closure · deep breathing · forgiveness · wailing · venting · acceptance · letting go · lamentation · hugging · weeping · abreaction · self-reflection · journaling
- emotional tropestragedy, romance, drama, love story, tearjerker
- tragedytragedy, tragic flaw, tragic hero, tragic heroes, tragic irony
- dramaturgydramaturgy, dramaturg, dramatic structure, dramatic technique, dramatic form
- Hypnosishypnotist, hypnotherapist, trance state, trance states, autohypnosis
cathartic releasesuppression
Forcible prevention or concealment
repression · bottling up · stifling · emotional restraint · self-censorship
cathartic releaseaccumulation
Collected mass over time
festering · bottleneck · emotional baggage · chronic tension · rumination