Feelings are what we want more than anything. We long to feel good, to feel happy all of the time. Many of us even believe it’s the goal of our lives…to create never-ending happiness. But this belief, that happiness is the ultimate result, often leads us to argue with and make enemies of any emotion we view as less desirable than happiness. Herein is where the problem begins. We learn from an early age that if happiness is the goal, anything less just won’t do. This causes us to create patterns of expecting our feelings to always feel good and when they don’t, we’re not having it…AT ALL. These emotions that don’t feel good, these negative emotions we call them, then become unacceptable to us and allowing them into our world is something we’re unwilling to do. Thus, we become expert negative emotional avoiders, resisters, and reactors in an effort to curtail experiencing feelings that just don’t feel good. We become adept at these practices, masters in fact, of keeping these emotions at bay (or so we believe) instead of becoming skilled, masterful feelers of ALL the feels. 😉
We MUST know how to feel our feelings. It will change your life!
That’s what I want to teach you here today.
Life is meant to have a balance. Good and bad, warm and cold, light and dark, happy and sad. This balance of 50/50 is what allows our experience as humans to be vibrant, rich, and varied. We don’t fully appreciate the warmth of a summer day without the bone-chilling cold of a freezing winter night. This contrast is what creates the depth, breadth, and beauty of our life experience as humans. Happiness means more, feels better and is cherished more deeply when we’ve experienced sadness as its opposite. Life is meant to be comprised of 50/50 and emotions are no different. Expecting anything other than the 50/50 contrast is what results in our failed attempts to eliminate negative emotion in hopes of keeping and allowing only positive emotion.
Imagine with me for just a few minutes. 😉
Allowing:
Let’s invite a positive emotion to your front door by thinking a thought. Happiness is now knocking on your door because you’re thinking, “My teen did his chores today without me reminding him 50 times.” You look out the peephole and notice it’s Happiness. Remember, you’ve invited Happiness to your home by thinking a thought. How do you respond?
If you’re like the majority of humans, you quickly reach for the handle, swing the door wide open and invite Happiness in with the warmth of a generous hostess. You greet Happiness, welcome her in, and graciously show her to the couch as you compliment her lovely new outfit and freshly styled hair. As she sits down, you ask her if she’d like an ice-cold beverage or a delicious snack and quickly race to retrieve it from the kitchen and place it in her hands. You sit next to Happiness as long as she’s willing and wanting to stay. You don’t check your watch, think of other things you could/should be doing. Oh no, you give your full and undivided attention to Happiness until she graciously excuses herself. You then walk her to the door, thank her for coming over, and invite her back whenever she would like to come. You also ensure as she’s walking away that she knows how much you enjoyed her company and how welcome she is in your home in the future.
This is allowing emotion. This is a representation of what it’s like to process a feeling. To let it be in our bodies. To notice it, to accept it, to let it wash over us without wanting to change it, push it out, or shorten its duration. We acknowledge we invited it to be there by thinking a sentence in our brain, a thought. We own the responsibility for creating the emotion and choose to open ourselves up to fully feeling the feeling. We don’t hide from it or push it away. We embrace it, we accept it, we let it come in and we treat it with the warmth of a kind and generous hostess. We let it linger and remain as it lives out its lifecycle. Soon it leaves as quickly as it once came.
Avoiding:
Let’s now invite a negative emotion to your front door by thinking a thought. Sadness is knocking on your door because you’re thinking, “My teen doesn’t want to talk with me.” You look out the peephole and notice it’s Sadness. Remember, you’ve invited Sadness to your home by thinking. How do you respond?
Again, if you’re like the majority of humans, you don’t open the door. You stare at Sadness through the peephole wondering if he knows you’re home. You go into stealth mode, being extra quiet, hoping he’ll go away. Thinking you can trick him AND forget he’s there, you sneak away on your tip-toes into the kitchen looking for a snack. Yes, eating a treat will help you feel better about leaving Sadness waiting at the door. You quickly down several doughnuts just in time to hear him knock again. This time with more force. He knows you’re home! He knocks again and again. Your mind races with ways you could distract yourself from the visitor waiting to be let in at your door…more doughnuts, cookies, Netflix, “likes” on Instagram. You indulge yourself. Now the knocking is louder and stronger. Sadness hasn’t chosen to leave, he’s chosen to stay and knock with more fervor and conviction than ever before.
This is avoiding emotion. This is a representation of what it’s like to avoid feeling a feeling. To sense the emotion in our bodies but disliking the vibration so much that we choose to numb it, dull it, or escape it through a buffering behavior. These buffering behaviors distract us from experiencing a negative emotion by turning our focus to something else. Buffers can include overeating, overdrinking, overworking, shopping, Netflix, social media, the Internet, or pornography. We create a temporary fix or distraction from experiencing the emotion, but the emotion soon returns as emotions must be processed for them to willingly leave on their own. Emotions we avoid not only come back, but they come back with a vengeance. Avoiding our feelings only causes them to grow, to escalate, to emerge more powerful. These avoided feelings then become increasingly uncomfortable to experience so we double-down on the buffering, adding a new buffer to our already familiar buffer. This process continues until eventually the emotion becomes so powerful it requires our attention by zapping our ability to function. By this time, it’s likely we’ve invited additional emotions into the picture and layered them on each other until we’re completely overcome by it all (miserable, depression, anxiety, stress). This is when we snap. Or break. Or lose it at the smallest of triggers. A seemingly insignificant circumstance triggers a thought that creates a feeling and we burst. We can’t control ourselves anymore. Ugghhh.
Reacting:
Let’s invite another negative emotion to your front door by thinking a thought. Anger is knocking on your door because you’re thinking, “My teen lied to me.” You look out the peephole and notice it’s Anger. Remember, you’ve invited Anger to your home by thinking a thought. How do you respond?
If you’re like the majority of humans, you notice it’s Anger instantly so you grab the handle and forcefully swing the door open wide as you begin yelling at the top of your lungs. “You shouldn’t be here. I don’t want you here. You can’t be on my property. You’re trespassing and I’m going to call the cops!” You continue screaming and shouting while throwing your arms in the air with your fists shaking in Anger’s face to ensure your message is being understood and taken seriously. You give no airtime to Anger to express himself so he begins to fight with you and an all-out brawl ensues.
This is reacting to emotion. This is a representation of what it’s like to let an emotion control our behavior as we “act” out what we’re feeling. It’s as if we’re outwardly displaying what we’re so powerfully experiencing on the inside. Almost like we’re on stage depicting or acting out our emotions for an engaged audience. We dramatize the feeling or freak out about it. This is what children do when they throw a tantrum. They’re simply displaying for us to see what’s going on inside their bodies. Adults have these tantrums too. One of the problems with reacting to emotion is our future decision (almost out of what feels like a necessity) to look back and judge how we reacted. This creates another negative emotion, regret, as we analyze and evaluate how we “acted out”. We judge ourselves and our behavior and attach labels to what we’ve done. “You have a temper.” “You’re a mess.” “You should be able to control yourself.” This extra layer of judgment results in us reacting more and more to our emotions as we internalize these labels as truth and begin to live through them.
Resisting:
Let’s now invite yet another negative emotion to your front door by thinking a thought. Insecurity is knocking on your door because you’re thinking, “I’m not a good mom like everybody else I know.” You look out the peephole and notice it’s Insecurity. Remember, you’ve invited Insecurity to your home by thinking a thought. How do you respond?
And one more time, if you’re like the majority of humans, you immediately and forcefully thrust your body against the door in an effort to ensure Insecurity doesn’t come in. But, the noise and force of your body hitting the door alert Insecurity that you are indeed inside. Insecurity is now more determined than ever to come in. She begins to twist the handle to open the door and pushes with all her might against it. You, on the opposite side, are doing the same. You’re both pushing against the door and each other. Neither of you is willing to give up this fight so battling it out till the death is now the only option. Your feet start to slide on the tile floor as Insecurity makes a sudden push to gain the upper hand and force her way into your home. You dig your heels in deep in a last-ditch effort to keep her out.
This is resisting emotion. This is a representation of what it’s like to push against emotion with tremendous force to ensure we don’t experience it. To keep it out, to shut it down, to do anything but allow it in. Resisting emotion is like trying to push a beach ball underwater. It can be done for a while, but it’s exhausting. Eventually, more force and effort are going to be required of you to keep the ball under the water as the pressure from below the ball builds in equal measure to yours. Soon, with the pressure maxed out on both sides, the ball shoots out of the water in an explosive and violent eruption. This is resisting. It works for a brief moment, but without fail, the emotion erupts through. Just like with avoiding, this is when we snap. Or break. Or lose it at the smallest of triggers. A seemingly insignificant circumstance triggers a thought that creates a feeling and we burst. We can’t control ourselves anymore. Ugghhh.
Alright, we’re done imagining. 😉
The four ways we respond to emotion are allowing, avoiding, reacting, or resisting. We each, as unique individuals, integrate and use a mixture of these methods for various emotions. It’s our responsibility to gain awareness about our emotional tendencies and habits so we can work to improve them. The ultimate goal of emotional management and maturity is to learn to allow all feelings, positive and negative, those that feel good and those that feel terrible. Learning through repetitious practice how to be the kind and gracious hostess, opening the door willingly to every emotion that shows up, inviting them in, and allowing them to stay for as long as they desire, is what we aim for. This learning will always result in a more empowered, grounded, and self-confident human that can easily adapt and handle any circumstance the world offers them, even Coronavirus.
This work I’m asking you to do is not easy. The things I’ve taught this month are not widely accepted in society. If you’ve chosen to embark on this journey of mental and emotional management, you’re in the minority. You’re one of the few that is willing to do hard things. Willing to go against the grain in an effort to create a better life for you and your teenager. I applaud you. I’m doing the work right along beside you and I’m always here to offer my support and guidance.
It’s not easy to open the door willingly to embarrassment, shame, grief, loss, insecurity, frustration, anger, sadness, or sorrow. I get that, but it can be done.
Start by giving yourself the gift of being willing to try.
