Much of the work I do in helping people find more peace and purpose in life is teaching them how to heal their relationship with their emotions. We naturally resist negative emotions. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to feel good, obviously. The problems arise when we overidentify with our emotions, judge or ignore the ones we don’t like, or become trapped in a life of avoidance.
We are not our emotions. We’re the being who is experiencing the emotion. Emotions arise as messengers, each containing vital information that we can use to guide us to the life we desire.
When we don’t “listen” to feelings such as anger, guilt, or sadness, we miss important invitations to know ourselves deeper, to heal, to grow, to live life in the present moment.
We experience emotions in our heads through the stories we tell ourselves. We judge the emotion as “right” or “wrong,” “valid” or “invalid,” and if we don’t approve of the emotion, we invite in self-judgment, which only adds to our misery. Perhaps you feel jealous that your best friend, who was on the exact same diet as you, easily shed 15 pounds while you’ve struggled to move 5. You judge the jealousy as wrong, you think you should be happy for your friend, or you should’ve tried harder, you think there’s something wrong with you. So now you’re not only jealous, but you feel guilty and pitiful for having had the feeling in the first place.
Imagine now that instead of judging jealousy and creating a self-abasing story around it, you simply related to the initial feeling with curiosity. This might look like, “Hmm, I’m aware that jealousy is here. Interesting. Why is this feeling visiting me?” This prevents the secondary feelings of guilt, anger, or shame and allows you to open up to your experience. You’re not a “jealous person,” you’re a person who is having feelings of jealousy. This subtle act of detachment allows you to not lose yourself in the cycle of self-judgment and defeat. You can simply notice the feeling is there and then ask what it’s trying to tell you. Perhaps you never wanted to diet in the first place. Perhaps your heart would rather be picking up a paint brush or starting a blog. Perhaps the real you longs to be liberated from the belief that you need to lose weight to be happy. Or perhaps you simply feel jealous, and that’s OK, too. It’s an emotion in your body, it’s not who you are.
When we choose to stop fighting our feelings, ignoring them or telling them they aren’t welcome, we cultivate a relationship with them that will lead us deeper into the true desires of our heart. Life is experienced through emotions. To feel is to be alive. They’re not good or bad, they simply are. And we need not fear what they’re here to tell us, because they’re always on our side. Emotional freedom doesn’t mean we don’t experience hard emotions, it means we’re no longer ruled by avoiding negative emotions and chasing positive ones. It means we can soften to life, take down our walls, and become fully present to what is, trusting that whichever emotion comes to visit, we’re big enough to entertain it.
This poem, “The Guest House,” by Rumi, illustrates this beautifully.
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
Still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
If you have questions you would like answered in this article, or would like to inquire about coaching please submit to rebecca@rebeccastarkcoaching.com. Rebecca Stark Thornberry is a mastery certified life coach and the owner of Rebecca Stark Coaching. You can contact her at 720-412-6148 or visit rebeccastarkcoaching.com
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The Relationship Coach: Another way to relate to your emotions - Longmont Times-Call
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