Emotions Justified, but Why Linger?

            As humans, we are blessed with an emotional spectrum unlike any other specie. I find this human quality to be one of the most beautiful things about us. Emotions so raw on both ends of the spectrum that reminds us we are alive. I’m bringing this topic to your attention, because our emotional being is important to understand and we all should create an active conscious conversation in our heads that constantly interacts with our emotions- feeling, moving, sifting, analyzing them from a distance as a bystander instead of the one feeling them. Our emotional spectrum ranges widely and the pendulum can swing violently, slowly, peacefully , or erratically from one end to another. The spectrum is nuanced however and rarely is it just one emotion that we feel. We often put our emotions in binary terms because it’s the way we mostly learned to express ourselves. We either feel good or we feel bad. We’ve trapped ourselves in a duality of one or the other when really we are capable of feeling many emotions with incredible strength at the same time. I know recently I have felt relief at the same time as great sadness. I’ve felt happiness along with anger. I’ve felt anger along with jealousy. In one day my emotions might cover all the bases along the spectrum. I know you have too. I believe that in order to become more intimate with ourselves we must parse these emotions and look at the nuances in our emotional blender. Anaylzing, being aware, creating space, and creating discipline for our emotions leads to a healthier, happier life.

Obviously I could write on the topic of emotion indefinitely, but today I want write about the emotions that while we feel justified, don’t serve us. So what might that be? Well here’s a personal example. I recently had a breakup with someone I love dearly. Her and I were together for almost two years and when it came time to finally call it quits my heart was and is still hurting. Each day I feel enormous waves of emotions crashing into me trying to overpower my will to continue my daily tasks like I would any other day. It’s been through great discipline developed by years of practice that has kept me from sinking into a dark place. The discipline has kept the sadness from turning into self pity. Or the anger into wishing her unwell. The inability to see her side of things into malicious judgement of her narrative of things. There were things that happened though that justify these feelings- the anger, the judgement, the self pity, sadness, etc. and to be honest, I so badly want to choose them, because I know it’s okay to feel them. I want to be MORE than okay though. And I want to push you to be more than okay as well in your life.

Buddha says “holding onto anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intention of throwing it at someone, yet you’re the one that gets burned.” It is not wrong to feel what I would coin as “negative” emotions and it’s incredibly human to do so. I mainly adhere to Buddhism and Buddhism will tell you expectation/desire is the root of all suffering. The sadness, anger, judgement, etc that we all sometimes feel is wishing that things were different than they actually are. It’s us resisting how things actually are and creating friction that causes us more pain and steals away our happy selves. By no means am I saying it’s not okay to feel these emotions. What I am saying though is it is possible to minimize the amount of time and emotional space that we give to low vibrating emotions and with time and practiced discipline you can eventually choose to feel those emotions healthily or just let them go.

Low vibrating emotions change the frequency of our being. It changes our perspective and how we see and interact with the world. It can lower the vibrations of those around us thus having a direct impact in other people’s lives outside of our own. So how do we minimize the time and emotional space we have for these emotions? We have to train our minds to do so. The first step is always creating awareness. We must constantly be analyzing our emotions and sifting through the different flavors of what we are feeling. When you’re sifting through them and find something that you get stuck around, look at it as if it were outside you. Very often when my “negative” emotions feel large and about to be in charge, I visual balling them up and throwing them onto a ship that I can watch passing along through the water. This visualization helps me create distance from these emotions, reminds me “I’m not my feelings, they are just expressions of me in this time/space”, and creates a situation where I can stand as a bystander to my own emotions. Try creating a visualization that can do the same for you.

The second step is to not resist your emotions. We often end up in a lower state of vibration for longer by fighting ourselves for feeling the way we do. We make judgements against our own emotions like “I shouldn’t feel this, I’m being dramatic, I should just get over it.” Don’t do that! If you have to feel the emotions let yourself feel them, just be wary that you don’t feel them for too long. We all know when we have passed our point of moderation and the sadness can turn into self-pity/victimhood or anger turns into violent thoughts and actions. We get stuck in these feelings because they feel so justified! And they are, but again they aren’t serving the happy you that you want to be. 

The third step is to not identify who you are with what you feel. One of the most prevalent things I hear people say is “This is just who I am or how I am” and that just might be the most poisonous phrase one can utter. This phrase is also stating “I’m helpless against whatever it is I’m facing, that I’m not strong enough to be different, that I don’t have the power to create the change I want to see in my life” and that’s just incredibly untrue. Many times these low vibrating emotions drag us into feeling deep ineptitude and make judgements against ourselves that don’t accurately reflect that we are immensely powerful and can create change the moment we choose to stick our willpower behind it. Instead of saying “I am sad.” Try changing your language to “I’m being sad or I’m being angry.” This change might seem superfluous, but I promise this tiny change itself reminds you that your emotions aren’t permanent, and you won’t always feel this way. You’re not stuck and things will get better again. 

The fourth step is to repeat steps one through three as Brian Mcknight would say. By creating awareness you will become more adept at seeing the nuances of your emotions and understanding yourself. You’ll realize that the emotions don’t stick and like all things, they too shall pass. By not resisting what you’re feeling you give yourself the grace and space to honor those emotions as needed. This helps you to move through the “negative” low vibrating frequencies more quickly. By not identifying who you are with what you feel, you remind yourself there’s nothing that you’re incapable of. You remind yourself that your emotions are not you, just expressions, and they too shall pass. By repeating these three steps you’ll gain greater freedom from your emotions. You will feel more in charge and at the helm of your ship and you’ll be able to spend more of your time in a happier, high vibrating frequency that attracts the same energy! This energy attracts love, light, and healing. All the ingredients that make the most beautiful recipe- A happy life.

Love you Fam,

Thadeus