“Painful feelings are, by their very nature, temporary. They will weaken over time as long as we don’t prolong or amplify them through resistance or avoidance. The only way to eventually free ourselves from debilitating pain, therefore, is to be with it as it is. The only way out is through.” ― Kristin Neff,

Remember that song from childhood, “Going on a Bear Hunt?” It tells us that we can’t go around, under, or over the obstacle but we must go through. This is wonderful wisdom for life, yet it’s something our modern society has forgotten, especially when it comes to emotions. 

Emotions are not the ‘enemy,’ to escape, avoid, or fight. Emotions are our allies, trying to help guide us to live our truth and be empowered to move towards our authentic self.

From the point of view of Traditional Yoga, emotions are part of prakriti. Prakriti is a Sanskrit word that comes from Samkhya Yoga, a philosophy of Yoga. It is the source of everything that is impermanent and transitory. Anything that is prakriti is not our True Nature or True Self. Since emotions change, they can not be ‘Who I am,’ yet most of us misidentify emotions as ‘Who I am.’

EMOTIONS ARE IMPERMANENT

Why is it important to remember that emotions are impermanent and transitory?

Because, by realizing this, they no longer have power over us. They are something to observe, get curious about and use to understand more who you truly are.  If you can grasp this concept, it is empowering. No longer does anger, fear, worry, etc. need to be viewed as truth and fact. They don’t get to control you and have power over you if you can understand this.

Rather, emotions are a tool of communication of the mind-body system that you can get skilled at listening to. By listening and getting curious about emotions, you can discern what is fact and what is not. From there, you can find the clarity you need to take conscious action and make conscious choices.

I don’t know what is more empowering than that.

EMOTIONS DON’T NEED TO BE ‘FIXED’

As a mental health professional for the last two decades, I had grown increasingly uncomfortable with the pathologizing of ‘negative’ emotions as something to ‘fix.’ Through my Yoga training, I realized there is nothing to ‘fix’ with emotions. Instead, it’s important for us to accept emotions, lean into them, and get to know them. Doing this diffuses many of those emotional reactions and helps a person to see the truth, rather than attach to the story emotions tend to weave.

Many emotional reactions and how to meet them are learned behaviors. I’ve been spending some time with my two-year-old neighbor, Sidney, and it’s fascinating to watch him learn about emotional reactions. He bumped his lip on the table and his mother gave him a hug and stated, “Oops. Did you bump the table? Looks like you’re okay.” He looked at me and my husband. Then he started to play again. It was all ‘okay.’ That was his story that was reassured by the adults around him..

What would have happened if his mother got upset when she saw there was some blood on his lip?

Most likely, he would have gotten upset. But taking cues from his environment, Sidney rolled with it and moved on.

A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE

How we meet our emotional reactions mainly comes from what we learned growing up and through the experiences of life. We just keep repeating it over and over again. Being aware that emotions and the initial reactions aren’t “who I am’ is that first step to changing emotional reaction patterns..

The next step is realizing since emotions and reactions change, you have a CHOICE to continue the pattern of reaction or decide to do it differently. It’s not something that happens over night or without effort, but with practice the reaction can change into a conscious response. 

5 QUESTIONS TO PRACTICE

Here are 5 questions to start using when you have an emotional reactions:

• What emotions am I feeling right now? (Bonus is can you identify emotions beyond ‘happy, mad, sad?’)
• What am I feeling in my body right now?
• What are the thoughts happening with this emotion?
• Are these thoughts 100% true? Why or Why Not?
• How do I, not my emotions, want to deal with this situation?

It might take some time to find answers to these questions, so take the time. There are very few situations in life where we can’t step away and take time to find how we want to consciously respond.

Emotions are not the enemy, they are our allies.

Namaste.

P.S. Are you a woman in the ‘helping professions?’ Curious about all of this and want to learn more? Watch my Free, Online Masterclass: The Find Calm Formula™.” Move from feeling lost, stuck or distressed to creating the emotional breakthroughs to make the best decisions in the next phase of life.