Addressing Emotions

Many of us are on some level stressed, depressed, anxious, angry or dealing with emotions that keep popping up. It is difficult to find where and when the emotions hit the arousal system and manifest into us deciding that we need something externally as an intervention.

The incredible thing is that many times we have the capacity to self-regulate these feelings if we bring them front and center. Rather than being a victim of what is happening inside of us, our systems have the capacity to enable us to be in charge and change our own thoughts.

Here is what happens. It starts with a sensation which is interpreted as frightening. You can dig into the sensation or draw your awareness to change the sensation by moving, breathing, tapping, and touching. Using any of these processes, rather than tolerating feelings and sensations will give you the capacity of putting yourself in charge of your own physiological system. You can actually calm yourself down by talking, moving and working through the processes.

If you feel helpless; unable to move and don’t do anything to address it then it will just keep coming back. Our bodies are trying to communicate with us, in fact, we are physical beings and we communicate verbally and nonverbally ie. nodding, smiles, and moving as much as we do with what we actually say. Changing focus and trying an activity that requires a range of physical effort can be exactly what you need.

When you focus to learn to know what you know… and feel what you feel… this process brings together the language of the internal experience and the sensation to then be released. In other words, to identify and find words for your internal state enables us to normalize, accept and permanently release the sensations.

There are many activities that can be used as tools to enable you to teach yourself to self-regulate. My favorite activities for myself and clients are yoga, hiking, breathing exercises and reiki. So next time, before you take to eating, drinking, putting it out on the road or whatever your default management behavior may be…

Make a sensory change, find something to pair with that sensation and find a healthier way to address that emotion.