While I do believe it is very important to experience and welcome all the emotions and learn to work with them, I feel that sometimes we allow them to take over our lives and to shape us…which is great if it’s the positive emotions of love, joy and peace, but not so awesome if they are on the negative spectrum of emotions, like fear, anger and sadness.
We all have days when we experience these negative emotions and it’s totally normal and human…it’s unrealistic to expect we will be happy from now on and nothing will shake us…we all have a belief system we have created usually quite early on in life and some situations will make us feel vulnerable and will unfortunately get the “worst” of us…not because we wanted to but because it is maybe the only way we know how to deal with that situation and the uncomfortable feeling of vulnerability, feeling exposed…
Also negative emotions are not always bad…sometimes it’s important to allow ourselves to feel sad, sometimes fear is really helping us to stay safe…
In the end everything comes back to awareness, noticing what is happening inside (in our body and mind) and checking it with what is happening outside…many times those two experiences are very different…we may be sitting in the garden with our kids and “watching” them to play but our mind may be reliving a challenging conversation with someone at work which happened a few days ago…as a result of what is happening in our mind we may be feeling some negative emotions and tension within our body, even though there is not an immediate “threat”, and immediate experience causing us to hurt…
While humans seem to be at the top of the intelligence chain (something I often doubt to be true though 😉), we often do things which seem so counterproductive and antisurvival…We are one of the rare species (if not the only one) who suffers for something that happened or something that has not happened yet (and may not even happen) MORE THAN ONCE…our mind loves to “indulge” in negativity and when it has the chance to play, to emphasize, to recreate, it will do that…
Most of our suffering is not actually related to the moment at hand…what we are experiencing are only THOUGHTS, reliving an experience from the past or creating an experience in our mind about something that may happen in the future.
It’s really helpful when we are experiencing some stirring inside, some resistance, to stop and notice…and take a few breaths (if there is time to do that)…by giving ourselves some distance from the experience and time to process it, we give ourselves an opportunity to understand whether our perception is true or not…
Apart from trying to be present and mindful about the experiences coming into my life, there are a few mindful exercises that really resonate with me and that I am trying to remind myself of in various situations…it is something I am still learning…some days or weeks I am better at them and some worse…and yes, I also have days when I feel grumpy (even yoga teachers are sometimes 😉).
Here they are…
- Bring a gentler kinder perspective to what you are perceiving (this often helps me to be more objective and not judgemental).
- Check whether what you are doing is bringing value into your life, whether it is nourishing you.
- If you are facing a challenge, ask yourself if it is there because you need to learn something from it.
- Same goes when we have to deal with people who make us feel challenged in some way. See if you can stay open and loving. I have written a post about this a while ago, those who follow me on Instagram/facebook or read my posts on my blog, may have seen it…you can find it here :-)
- Focus on the bigger picture...when you feel overwhelmed, stop and breathe...take a few deep breaths into your belly and visualize softening through any tension in your body...breathing into the abdomen generates a relaxation response in the body and mind...there's a quote I am trying to remember in those moment when life is a bit hectic..."Almost everything can wait."...and it's true...rarely things that are causing us to feel stressed will in the end affect our lives or lives of others in a dramatic way, they are usually little things...so smile and breathe :-)
The list could go on and on...but I feel it's best to start with less and not to overwhelm ourselves with trying to do too much at once...
The more awareness we bring into our lives, the more we notice and realize that we are all vulnerable and we all have some weak spots. We become more compassionate and loving to each other and to ourselves, especially when we start seeing ourselves in actions and behaviours of other people. 🌷 🌸 🌿
