Today I want to talk about your feelings and emotions. Emotions are what drive us, the feelings on the higher end of the emotional spectrum like joy, love, happiness, move us forward. While other lower emotions, like fear, anger, jealousy can leave us rooted and stagnated.
I want to begin looking at these emotions and how knowing more about them and specifically your own feelings can help move you from stress and anxiety to joy and calm. What exactly does noticing your emotions without judgement even mean?
When I say notice your emotions, I mean when we pay attention to how we feel and examine it without judgment, we can see it for what it is. One of many feelings that exist. Our feelings are not who we are, they are not our controlling force. They are simply feelings. When we can see that they don't control us, we can feel them and fully experience them. When we can acknowledge the emotion, we see that it is fleeting.
Have you ever experienced this? When things feel like they are going too well. You are waiting for something bad to happen. You may be waiting for “the other shoe to drop”.
I know in my own story. There was a day when my children were young, I was a stay-at-home mom, going college to work on my biology degree. So, at that time my normal emotion was frazzled and actively stressed. I had one of those beautiful days, it was perfect in every way. I soaked in my family and my life. After I put the kids to bed, I became emotional and even sad feeling as I tried to explain why I was crying to my husband, but unable to put my feeling into words. Pure joy had mostly escaped me. Don’t get me wrong, I am a happy person. I had just never felt such pure joy in the way I had on that day, I started to feel scared. Like it was fleeting and would be replaced by negative feelings. I became terrified there would be a cost to that much happiness. Almost like, allowing myself to feel this strong happiness was throwing a coin of fate spinning through the air. And it was just a matter of time, for me to have to pay the price for this happiness. That is fear and other lower vibrational feelings to surface. It is true that all emotions are fleeting. When you feel pain and sadness it may feel like it will never leave. If you think about it logically how can the good emotions be fleeting even as you are feeling them, yet the negative feeling, never leave. You must realize, all emotions are the same. They have different vibrations, and different energies, and they certainly feel different. But all emotions are fleeting. Feelings will come and go. You will not.
When we add stories to the emotion we are feeling, or we criticize the fact we are
feeling a particular way, we give away our control of the emotion. Instead try to identify what the emotion is, notice if anything triggered this emotion and then without judging the fact that you are having this feeling, allow it to just be there, sit with it.
feeling a particular way, we give away our control of the emotion. Instead try to identify what the emotion is, notice if anything triggered this emotion and then without judging the fact that you are having this feeling, allow it to just be there, sit with it. Examine it with curiosity.
Let’s try a challenge of sorts. Think of yourself as a scientist running an experiment. If you find an emotion coming up, good or bad, you do this with all emotions. You may find the good ones are easier, so start with happy feelings. As you are experiencing an emotion, without using adjectives ask yourself, why am I feeling this emotion right now? Was there something that initiated it? Don’t do anything other than looking at it with curiosity. There should be no good or bad words or other feelings attached here.
Let’s look at a possible scenario… you run into a friend while shopping. You haven't seen them in a couple of months. This is someone you find nice and genuine. She smiles at you and warmly greets you. With a hug she says, wow you look amazing. Now it is understandable that you would feel happiness, but think for a moment and ask yourself why am I choosing to feel good at this moment? It could be the fact that you see someone you like to spend time with, it could be that you missed her and are enjoying the warm exchange, it could also be the compliment she paid to you.
None of these reasons are incorrect as there is no incorrect feeling. What I want you to realize is that they didn't require any explanation or justification for feeling them. Also equally important, whatever the reason is the right choice, these are personal feelings. What also is of equal note here is there is no story necessary to feel the feelings. They are real, and they don't change who you are or the essence of you.
What I hope you start to realize is this, your feelings do not change who you are, they are fleeting emotions, and your emotions change all the time, yet you stay the same. So, whether you are feeling happy, sad, anger, disgust, surprise, and fear the essence of you is unchanged. You can think of yourself as an observer of your emotions. Notice the variety of them, through the impartial eye of an observer. This will allow you to acknowledge the emotion without getting lost in it.
We examined the fun emotion of happiness; we can examine harder emotions in the same way. Look it over, notice what events led up to you feeling this way. Look at the situation that led you to these feelings, objectively. This skill, again a bit more challenging, can help in your stress, anxiety, or panic because when we can identify our feelings and emotions, realizing they are temporary and fleeting, they are not who we are, but merely a reaction of what we encounter.
0 Comments