Three ways to stop being afraid of your emotions
We are driven by emotions. Research indicates that 90-95 % of our decision making is based on emotions, not logic. Humans are not driven by logic. We are driven by emotions. That’s why our emotional capacity has such a huge impact on our lives. When our emotional capacity is limited, we tend to shut down and stop participating. If our emotional capacity runs wild, we easily become emotionally hijacked and our emotional reactions drive our behavior. It pays to harness the power of our emotions. Then they work for us as an integrated part of our guidance system. We can count on the messages our emotions send us and make choices that enhance our lives.
Dr David Hawkins work explains there are three ways to deal with emotions.
1. Expression. Emotions that are experienced wave through our consciousness. They are here and gone. We might not remember feeling them at all, until we recall a memory that elicits that emotion. Biologically, emotions last about 90 seconds. If they last longer than that they are arising out of suppressed or repressed emotions. Fully expressed emotions don’t leave us something to deal with later. They simply wave through.
2. Suppression. We consciously know how we feel but we avoid feeling it. Somewhere we learned that these emotions were bad or wrong, so we spend a tremendous amount of energy trying not to feel them. We will need an avoidance strategy, that may develop into an addiction, to cope with these suppressed emotions. Retail therapy. Substances. Working out. Yes. Even the good things that we use to deal with our emotions can get in the way of dealing with our emotions.
3. Repression. These emotions are buried so deep we can’t access them. They are unconscious and the source of our blind spots. They show up in our lives as denial or projections. We will see these emotions in everyone around us but can’t access them ourselves.
Developing our capacity for all emotions and letting them wave through our consciousness brings healing and full self-expression. Healthy emotional expression connects us to our humanity, builds relationships and develops the emotional part of our guidance system.
Understand emotional addictions and defaults.
Our upbring heavily influences which emotions are acceptable to express and which ones are not. When we are not allowed to authentically express our emotions, we create an emotional comfort zone. It appears like our emotions don’t fit the current situation. For example, if we were taught to laugh when we wanted to cry, chances are we are operating out of an emotional comfort zone.
Because emotions are a biochemical reaction in the body, it is possible that emotions can become addictive. I once knew a woman who was addicted to love. She was married and divorced 5 times. She left as soon as the honeymoon was over, always seeking the feeling of falling in love. If a person is repeating a pattern time and time again, there’s a chance an emotional addiction is at play.
These two ways of coping with emotions can cut us off from living a full and happy life. A lot of time and energy is wasted avoiding our emotional experiences and we miss out on worthwhile experiences that enhance our lives.
It’s important to grow our emotional capacity through conscious emotional exploration. Having more than a hand full of emotional interpretations allows us to accurately share what we are experiencing. Emotions add the richness to our lives.
Identify your emotional avoidance strategies and addictions.
All emotions express. When we won’t feel one emotion, it generates another. They either come out authentically or they come out as something else. Emotions always express.
Avoiding emotions causes confusion and gets in the way of creating the connections we desire. If we trade short term discomfort of expressing our emotions, it leads to long term resentment. If this has been a long-held pattern, we might not be able to explain why we feel how we feel.
Seeking emotional experiences can be just as detrimental as avoiding them. If we seek trade short term pleasure for long term pain. We will take the hit of feeling good even if we will pay a price later. Before consciously choosing what emotions, you want to feel, it’s important to develop the capacity to express all of them. Choosing our emotions can be an avoidance strategy that keeps us stuck.
Cultivate emotional sobriety.
Emotional sobriety is the ability to allow yourself to feel an emotion without attaching to it and averting it. When you’re not under the influence of your emotions you can listen to what they are telling you. They can be the very guidance you trust.
Release the charge of your emotional back log.
Denying our emotions creates an emotional back log. They don’t go away we either medicate them or internalize them. Reducing the emotional charge grants the freedom to feel and let them wave through. We stop rationalizing and explaining our emotions and just feel them. We feel what we feel, knowing they only last 90 seconds. This process takes as long as it takes. Months or years. Once the back log of charge or shutdown is dealt with, we can open to expanding our emotional understanding and expression. Our emotions no longer run us.
Practice giving our emotions space and suspending judgment for having these emotions. As the backlog is processed, we come across emotions that are repressed. They seem to come out of nowhere and not make any sense. Repressed emotions are revealed by our triggers or where we shutdown.
Triggers that are followed by an automatic response, arise out of our conditioning. Since the trigger, the emotion and the action are all collapsed into one, it’s important to feel these without acting. Feeling the emotion without acting, breaks the habit of acting from our emotions. It’s a practice of self-discipline (not punishment). If you are triggered and have a strong uncontrollable reaction to it chances are there is a repressed emotion present. Place your hand on your heart. Say something to yourself like “Triggered. I’m just triggered.” Or “I’m here.” Do your best to not take any action other than an act of self-care, like removing yourself from the situation. Train yourself to separate the emotion from an action. Create space and grace for what you haven’t been able to express until now.
Triggers that are followed by shutdown, requires a lot of space and grace. Allow the emotional expression to arise and express without judgment. No words of explanation or description of the experience. Grunt. Growl. Give yourself to a movement. Movement that encourages expression, not performance is the key. Act it out without an audience. Scribble on a paper. Beat the couch with a pool noodle when no one is home. Act it out without an audience. Just you and you. Feel and act. Go until it’s done and return whenever there are no words. This brings the repressed emotions to the surface where the charge can be released.
Practice emotional integrity.
Emotional Integrity is being honest, whole, and undivided. You feel what you feel without explaining your emotions or being talked into or out of feeling a certain way.
All emotions are important. There are no such things as negative or positive emotions. Just emotions we prefer. Where we can identify and experience every emotion, we tap into the powerful guidance of our emotions. We are empowered to choose our emotional state. We use our emotions to align our actions to what’s important to us.
When we can be present with the emotions we are experiencing and watch them, they change. We can feel them and heal them. When we are free from our emotions driving our actions, we can choose what feels whole and integrated. Then, do that. It feels good deep down to feel our emotions and choose our actions because they work together.