Always take yourself seriously, just not literally.

Most people always take their emotions and feelings in a literal sense. That is to say, that how they are feeling at any given moment is literally about the issue at hand that has brought that specific emotion to the surface. With more reflection, and by that I mean listening by the Holy Spirit, to the one who can guide us through the depths of our hearts, we often come to realize that the emotions being experienced are serious, but not literal. (Proverbs 20:10-The purposes of a man's heart are deep waters, 
but a man of understanding draws them out),

We need a man of understanding to draw out the depth of what is going on in our hearts. That is, to take us beyond the literal situation and feelings to their very root and source. What is often mistaken is that we need to become a man of understanding, rather than realizing that Christ is the man of understanding, and we have been given fullness in Christ (Colossians 2:9-10 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority.)

When we seek the man of understanding, instead of trying to be him, we find the freedom in Christ to take our emotions seriously, rather than literally, and we can access healing and understanding that in taking our emotions literally and dealing with them alone, can never be had.

John 4:9-15: The Samaritan woman said to him, "You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?" (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)
Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water."
"Sir," the woman said, "you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his flocks and herds?"
Jesus answered, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life."
The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water so that I won't get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water."

When we take the thirst seriously, not literally, we find what the thirst is really all about. Jesus took the woman seriously, just not literally. Water was what she thought she literally needed, but what the “man of understanding” knew she seriously needed was the “living water” only he could bring.