What goes wrong when you ignore that cultural norms around expression?

The most common reason fails: Treating your own cultural expression norms as the universal default and interpreting deviations as pathology — labeling someone from a high-restraint culture as "emotionally repressed" or someone from a high-expression culture as "emotionally dysregulated" when both are operating within functional, adaptive cultural systems.

The fix: Identify three emotional expression norms you inherited from your culture of origin. For each one, write down what the norm prescribes (e.g., "do not cry in public," "express gratitude effusively," "minimize anger displays"). Then identify a context in your current life where that norm serves you well, and a context where it creates friction or misunderstanding. For the friction context, describe what the local expression norm seems to be and how you might adapt your expression without abandoning your authentic emotional experience.

The underlying principle is straightforward: Different cultures have different norms for emotional expression — be aware of context.