Feelings are energy. Sad, depressed, “I can’t do it” or “this is overwhelming” type feelings keep us in a lower frequency. Not letting ourselves feel our feelings at all keeps us ill.
Feeling your feelings is paramount. They go somewhere. If you don’t acknowledge them and become accountable for them, if you instead push them down, they go into your body tissue and lodge somewhere and make you sick.
Feelings are information. They are authentic. They are you. They aren’t positive and they aren’t non-positive, they just are. It’s our reaction and how we respond to them that is either helpful or non-helpful to us.
If we deal with a lot of stress that we don’t know how to handle very well, those feelings we stuff down really hurt us physically in a big way. We get ulcers and hearts that “break,” which sounds kinda silly, but heart disease is real. Our muscles get tired from all the adrenaline that rushes through our system because of the feelings we refuse to think or talk about, and we end up with an exhausted endocrine system. And that suppresses our immune system. And then we get sick with a cold or flu or worse. And we overeat to stuff our feelings and soothe our spirits, but that encourages diabetes and obesity, which makes us feel bad about ourselves ans slowly kills us.
Sometimes the effect is slow and buried under layer after layer, but eventually, we will have to deal with it, either with intention or because our bodies break down.
Getting caught up in whether our feelings are “right’ or “wrong” is a waste of energy and time. Instead, just naming them, saying what they are without judgment, is how we grow through them, when we’re ready.
You may identify “grief” as the emotion you’re feeling, but maybe that grief is attached to the passing of a loved one, and just because you identified it doesn’t mean it’s going to go away unless you decide you’re ready to release it.
You might not be ready to “let go” of the intense feelings about that person you loved. And that’s ok. Where pretending it doesn’t exist hurts us, acknowledging the fact it exists and deciding if we’re ready or not to let it go starts to heal us. Just that one thing.
If you’ve experienced trauma in your life, and who hasn’t, you’ve got layers of pain and emotion in your tissues. Some of the sadness over sexual and physical abuse feelings are tricky because they are stuck tightly to shame and guilt that isn’t even ours, really, but there it is, stuck anyway. Extricating those from each other can be challenging and take some time. But saying that you feel sad and full of shame takes some of its power away. You looked at it. You shined a light on it. And it can’t hide anymore. And that’s the first step and it may be the only step you do for a long time, but it’s huge.
Then, in a few days when you’re having a really hard time and things start to get murky and you feel like crying and you’re yelling at someone you work with and you don’t know why, suddenly, you’ll remind yourself, hey. I do know why. I’m feeling really sad about what happened. And then maybe you’ll go ahead and cry, but it won’t make you sick.
And a few days/weeks/months after that, you’ll get that feeling bubbling up again, but this time, you’ve identified it so many times before that you know what it is right away. And this time, you’ll ask yourself, “Self – do I want to hang on to this anymore or is it time to move on?” And maybe you will and maybe you won’t this time but maybe next time, and it’s all perfect timing for you, whenever it happens.
Your body will appreciate the kind, gentle way you’re working with it and the patience and love and compassion you’re showing. Telling yourself to “just get over it” and “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” has helped no one, ever. But telling yourself, “You are doing such a good job identifying and owning your feelings” will help you every, single time.
You could also try asking your Self what kind of self-care you would like. Perhaps a bath or a walk or simply time in a quiet room to think and feel without interruption. You’ll thank you for it.
Meditation is a great option for getting in touch with your inner You. You can hear your intuition stronger when you close your eyes, concentrate on your breath and shut down the rest of the world.
Meditation increases your brain function and can help you release weight. It helps oxygenate your blood and lower your blood pressure. It helps reduce the cortisol and adrenaline running through your system, supports the immune function, helps with mood swings and helps you sleep better.
There are plenty of places online or in videos where you can look to find self-guided meditation help. Joining a group meditation where everyone in the room is Om-ing together is also wonderful, and you might want to try both.
In my meditation or quiet time, I sometimes practice what I call Catch and Release. With my eyes closed, I check around my body and in my chest to see what emotions I might have hanging around that I’m not aware of or acknowledging. I’ll grab that one over there, catch it, and this one over here, catch it, too, keeping them in my hands, looking them over and naming them.
It’s important to name them without judgment. For example, there is a big difference between saying to yourself, “I know I’m going to blow my diet again at Thanksgiving dinner,” and “I’m having anxiety about the food choices I might make at Thanksgiving dinner.” In the first one, you’ve already made a determination about what the future holds and that it’s “bad.” In the second one, you’re simply naming the issue. If you realize you’ve said something to yourself similar to the first one, just restate it in a gentler way, free of judgment. You’ll get the hang of it.
After catching and naming the feeling, make it a healing color that feels good to you that day then use your hands to make it smaller and smaller until it’s a bubble and small enough to blow away. Visualizing many beautiful bubbles blowing away on the breeze can be a healing thought.
This works for me. Sometimes the feeling will be back again the next day. And sometimes a few days in a row or more and that’s fine. But the simple act of acknowledging it and releasing it keeps my body healthier. I’ve found that kids like this visualization technique as well.
Follow this with an Essential Oil Blossom affirmation and you’ve got yourself quite a healing moment.
Try Something Good
Name an uncomfortable feeling you’re having right now. Remind yourself it’s neither positive nor non-positive, it just is, and it’s your reaction to it that helps or hurts you. Ask yourself what you can do to support yourself growing through it. Then, do it.