This idea of our emotions being our superpowers hit me on Monday after I finished 6 tarot readings for people and found myself saying this statement almost every time. What? Superpowers and emotions in the same sentence? Aren't these the little beasties that we're trying to tame, trying to stuff down or cover up as soon as they bubble to the surface?
I'm a crier. I can't help it. Things just hit me straight in the heart, the dam cracks and that's it.... Ask my family. Ask my kids. My 5 year old gets extra special excitement by glancing over at me and making a big show of rolling his eyes when he sees the tears flowing. It happens predictably when I watch Heartland (seriously nothing starts the waterworks like horses and humans learning to trust each other)! I let myself go when I'm at home with my family and watching tv and movies (it's acceptable to cry during movies), but I may have been looked at a bit during the movie 'Wild' when I was choking back sobs and then proceeded to cry all the way home. What can I say? I'm a big-hearted softie...
...but there are times when it's not quite so acceptable. Some of us have gone through life feeling like we are too much.... too much passion, too much anger, too much mushiness, too much crying, just tone it down would ya? or this one... You are using crying as manipulation! What? If I can't cry when I discuss this stuff that I'm feeling emotional about, I'm gonna walk out the door and that is the last time we will talk. Some of us just can't Be without being emotional. I am just tired of stuffing all this emotion down in my body and suffering physically because of it. I am tired of faking it!
What I really wanna talk about is the stuffing... Stuffing sucks. My whole life I have felt like a stuffed turkey, with all this stuff inside and sitting inside an oven that is heating up, burning me from the inside out. I know some will say that is too dramatic, but stop reading if you don't like it. This is me.
..and I'm not the only one. There are people all over this western free world who are stuffing. I see it in their eyes every day. I can feel the energy bursting from inside them and I can see the emptiness in their eyes.
This is the great joke... our emotions that we are trying so hard to pretend are not there... Are direct messages from our Soul. They ARE the path to healing.
There. I said it and now you know. There is no more avoiding it. If you want to heal, emotionally, physically, and/or spiritually, you gotta look at and begin to be friends with your emotions.
But how, you ask? life goes so fast. It's really hard to acknowledge emotions when I have one after another as I go through the day.
Number 1 healing action-Slow Down!
Slow the heck down! You cannot feel, let alone detect your emotions when you are flying around at 100 miles per hour! I know in this crazy world of today that is uber-hard.... if you're at all like me and have kids that are going to school and then activity after activity and friends' houses and meetings and oh yeah, your own work, and oh yeah, the house needs cleaning, the dog needs walked and those kids need to eat 3 times a day, what??? and it's really important to spend individual time with each of your 3 kids and oh yeah, your husband is needing some attention (imagine!) and oh yeah, Self Care....that thing.
Slowing your life down might feel impossible, but for healing in any situation, it is the first step and one that cannot be skipped!
Number 2 healing action- Slow down your mind!
If you balked at the first one and thought up all the reasons to justify why you absolutely cannot slow down because of the life you have (which is crap because choices have gotten us to where we are and different choices can slow down our lives, although I am NOT saying it is EASY!), you are really going to balk at this one.
Meditate!!!
You must. Meditation brings the awareness of the mind that is absolutely necessary for becoming aware of your emotions. Meditation comes in all kinds of packages these days. I am in no way saying you have to go and live in a cave while meditating 8 hours per day. There are so many new age ways of meditating that are supportive and gentle. For the monkey minds, it's often helpful to listen to guided visualizations. I find that listening to someone else's voice and having a set time of, "I will sit here until this person stops talking.", is sometimes a helpful way to go. Also, there are so many apps these days for people that like to be all techy about it. Or just go old school, sit in a quiet space, pay attention to your breathe and go.... it really is magic... but it can take time and it definitely takes commitment.
I won't pretend that I am a shining guru of meditation, but after many years and many trials, I have figured out my fave and most successful manner of meditating. Every morning (well almost every morning), after I wake up and before I get up, I do a chakra meditation. The 7 main chakras are energy centres within our bodies that relate to our physical bodies and to different levels of consciousness. I simply put my attention on one chakra at a time, starting with the root chakra, and ask my higher self or Soul or the Divine to strengthen and purify this chakra to the highest level. Then I move to the next chakra. Sometimes it helps to put hands on the chakras as I work on them to help me keep focus, but it is not necessary. I have come a long way with this. There is danger in doing this upon waking while still laying down, but I am able to do this now within a few minutes and feel refreshed and ready for the day.
Be patient with yourself. Creating a regular meditation practice can take lots of trying out this and experimenting with that and it does take a tonne of commitment! But the results you will see in your mental, emotional, and physical health are unbounded.
Number 3 healing action- Let your emotions flow!
Once life is slower and you can start to see the emotions when they rear their heads, it is important to say hi to them, welcome them into your life, and tell them you are listening for their messages. This may be the hardest step. So many of us, especially us sensitive ones, are spending incredible amounts of energy trying to keep our emotions from seeing the light of day, but this is necessary for healing. Our emotions have great wisdom. If acknowledged, they will always lead us to healing.
What do I mean by this? If I'm feeling angry or sad or confused about something, how does that lead to my healing? Because emotions are caused by thoughts that we are having about a situation. Strong emotions are usually caused by chronic thoughts which are belief systems. When negative or faulty belief systems are exposed and seen clearly for what they are, then and only then can they be changed. When they are changed or shifted, the person slips back into alignment with their Souls and healing occurs. For more information on this, check out the work of Abraham Hicks.
Number 4 healing action-Bring more LOVE into your life!
There are 2 energies in life, LOVE and FEAR. When we choose fear, we are blocking love from entering. That is all the science or woo-woo there is to life and alignment and health. Bringing more LOVE in is the answer to every blockage or health issue or life issue for that matter.
Ok, but how????
1. Start doing things that you used to love to do as a child. Get nostalgic. Play!
2. Be in nature every day! Walk barefoot as much as you can! The energy of the earth is LOVE. The more you immerse yourself, the more you feel Mother Earth's LOVE for you!
3. This is a big one that I was telling my daughter recently. If you had a child (which she does not, but she has a good imagination), would you treat that child in x, y, or z way like you treat yourself. We have to treat ourselves gently and with unconditional love like a parent would a child. This is a daily thing and includes watching how we speak to ourselves. We must speak gently and encouragingly to ourselves always!
4. Spend more time in the present moment. Fear lives in the past and in the future. With the self-awareness that you have cultivated through meditation, be aware of where your thoughts are. Are they focused on the future (worry) or on the past (regret, trauma, memories, guilt, shame).
5. Work on your energy centres. As mentioned above, clearing the chakras is important work for healing. There is so much information out there about the chakras. I also offer an 8 week course covering the chakras in depth and helping individuals release any blockages that are keeping them stuck in health or in life. Contact me for details.
6. And last idea for today (there are so many healing practices), Healing with Horses.... Not everyone is comfortable with horses or likes them. Regardless of our feeling toward these giants, they heal us when we are in their presence. Horses have an extremely large heart chakra. When we are near them, we feel this unless the feeling is held out by fear. Fear is a natural experience in the presence of a 1200 pound being. As we use the courage within our own hearts, though, and choose to do the work with the horse which can entail brushing, walking with, or just being near the horse, the fear slowly begins to drain out of us into the earth. When the fear drains, the LOVE rushes in. Healing has occurred!
Mostly, just look for JOY every day and as Abraham HIcks says, "make feeling good your top priority".
