When people feel depressed or angry or worthless or out of control or despairing or one of a hundred other painful experiences, they don't just feel bad; on top of that, they are afraid of their own feelings and fear they are trapped in a painful, dark place with no escape. In fact, with the right approach, painful emotional feelings can be easily healed and transformed. With the right approach, behind that depression, that anger, that worthlessness it is not difficult at all to find the strength, the positivity, the creativity, the love, the fullfilment which are your birthright and your inner nature.
Yet in the whole area of psychotherapy and personal development, there is nothing as misunderstood as emotions, surprisingly even by many therapists and teachers. There’s just so much confusion about whether emotions are good or bad, need to be felt or need to be got rid of, whether they are positive or damaging and dangerous. This article aims to illuminate one specific aspect of the the right way to transform painful emotions into peace and joy.
The confusion comes because, speaking broadly, there are two types of emotional feeling. I term these life-affirming and life-delaying emotions - so called because they delay getting on with life. [Strictly, these are two stages in the life cycle of the emotion, a stage to feel it and a stage to let go of it.]
Imagine the tears of a little child who is really hurt. Those tears touch our hearts. Even bystanders are moved to do anything to help. On the other hand a child’s crying can have an off-putting, I-want-my-way, boo-hoo-hoo quality which doesn’t touch our hearts. Instead, it moves us to a response which though caring is more brisk and matter-of-fact. Well, it’s the same for adult emotions too. For the onlooker, some tears, some anger, some fears touch the heart. Others are a turn-off.
Life-affirming emotions are real, true, emotions which touch the heart of the beholder; for healing and happiness, these need to be felt no matter how painful.
Life-delaying emotions are unreal, protective, or cover up deeper layers of real emotions, or they have a dramatic attention-seeking quality. These by contrast are valueless and need to be dropped this very instant, no matter how right they feel. Our everyday feelings and emotions are a complex mixture of these two. After we have felt them once or a few times, life-affirming emotions change into life delaying ones, and they too need to be dropped.
Life-affirming, genuine, helpful emotions – you briefly need to feel these fully, no matter how painful |
Life-delaying, unreal, unhelpful emotions – you need to drop these at once, no matter how familiar, inevitable or even good they feel |
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Important provisos
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Simple, basic, but it needs to be said. It’s just amazing how much people take misery and unhappiness for granted. In fact, everyone can feel joyful, blissful and peaceful. It is our very nature. It only takes the right approach for life to blossom. Do yourself a favour – after reading this article, never again take for granted feeling miserable. Do something about it! (For example, give me a ring.)
Defining emotions is like catching smoke in your hands. I’ve kept this simple.
Feelings are the aliveness of the body: pleasure, pain, affection, joy, fear, tenderness, risk-taking, sexuality, passion, courage, leaping into the unknown, feeling stuck, shocked, feeling free, and endlessly many more. Feelings are our aliveness.
The basic emotions are an emergency response to a real OR PERCEIVED emergency.
There are many other named painful “secondary” and “tertiary” emotions: dejection, despair, despair, depression, sadness, disgust, terror, anxiety, panic, irritation, scorn, spite, hysteria, rejection, feeling on top of the world …. Beyond those there is an infinite richness of un-named feelings personal to each of us.
There are particular feelings which accompany emotions. These are very important, but there is no clear name for them – surely a sign of the emotional illiteracy of the Western world. For want of a better word, I call these “emotional feelings.” If you look carefully, any emotion has three parts. Let's say someone, call her Mary, is angry with her husband; call him John. A friend asks her "How do you feel?" Typically, Mary's answer will have three parts:
These “emotional feelings” are a bridge between the conscious and unconscious mind, and they are a very important part of the self-healing process. Just as feeling the peak intensity of an emotion produces a deep relaxation (see below), so also clearly putting into words the inner "emotional feeling" inside the emotion produces a deep relaxation.
It is very, very helpful to move from feeling the raw emotion to experiencing the inner emotional feeling. In the example, Mary has choice. She can continue to put her energy into ranting about John and blaming him for why she feels angry. This is entirely counterproductive.
Or, she can tune into herself and discover WHY she is angry. Typically, merely by feeling (not intellectually, but really feeling) that “When he said what he said, I felt belittled” or "I feel betrayed " Mary will experience an inner relaxation. And she can communicate with John very differently and much more usefully.
For example, if you are treated unjustly, then being hurt or raging mad do not in the end help. You either assert yourself or you decide it truly doesn’t matter and let it go. (Letting it go is not the same as pretending, out of fear, that something doesn’t matter. That's a cop-out.)
Raw emotion sometimes helps with action or letting go, and sometimes not. The sharp pangs of fresh grief bring a deep letting go; and if you are physically attacked it is useful to be physically angry. But endless tears may well signal helplessness, and being routinely angry with people is hurtful, counterproductive, and covers insecurity. While being raging mad at injustice may be satisfying, it’s almost certainly more useful to channel that anger into calm assertiveness.
There is more on "good" and "unhelpful" emotions below. Nothing in this article should be taken to mean supressing or cutting off emotions. If you have to make any choice - choose to feel and choose to express, especially any emotion which is surfacing for the first time. The pressures to not feel and express are many and powerful and I don't want to add to them. But if anything in this article directs you to a deeper level of understanding where some emotion drops away, then allow that.
Just because someone feels inadequate or numb or inferior or superior to other people doesn’t mean they are inadequate or numb or inferior or superior. It’s just a feeling.
ANY feeling that makes a person think that they are in any way whatever no good is only a feeling; it is not a truth. Any such feeling a flavour of life, like different flavours of food.
When someone feels “I am no good” - it’s just a feeling, it is not a truth.
When someone feels “I can only be happy when I am in control” - it’s just a feeling, it is not a truth.
When someone feels “I am better ” - it’s just a feeling, it is not a truth.
When someone feels “I am numb, I never feel any aliveness” - it’s just a feeling, it is not a truth.
When someone feels “I can’t commit in a relationship” - it’s just a feeling, it is not a truth.
Negative feelings like these appear true because they’ve gone on for a long, long time. But the communist government of the old Soviet Union went on for a long, long time – and then overnight - poof! it was gone.
If someone feels deep grief, there is often the feeling that “I’ll never find anyone to love again.” When someone feels depressed, there is always the feeling “There’s nothing I can do, the future is going to be terrible.” These are not valid predictions. These are just feelings in the present.
When we are depressed, or angry, despairing we typically blame the world around us for that feeling: we think, "I am angry with John because John is nastly and attacked me;" "I dislike Mary because Mary is dislikeable;" "I feel despair because the situation is so hopeless."
But in fact, with John, and Mary, and whatever situation we are in, another person could have a very different response. Our feelings have very little to do with outside reality. They are mostly entirely about ourselves. That's true even when lots of other people happen to feel the same.
Typically, we think our emotions today come from what has happened to us today today. But almost always, the present situation is triggering some forgotten feeling from long ago. Depth hypno-analytic techniques help a person make the link and remember (for a simple example) “Aha! What my wife / husband is doing is reminding me of what my mother / father did.” In that very remembering, the emotion begins to drop away: you recognise it’s simply irrelevant to present time reality. Healing happens automatically.
Some emotions are carried across the generations. The effects of trauma and evil actions or deep misfortune can in truth be carried across generations and affect children and sometimes even great-grandchildren. This is a very exciting leading edge of therapy, the Family Constellations work of the German therapist Bert Hellinger and in particular the work on trans-generational trauma of family constellations therapist Franz Rupert.
There is inside each of us a still small voice of truth. Your inner voice is the voice of your intuition, of your inner intelligence and leads to calm, resourceful action. It is a reliable guide to how to live your life in a joyful, positive, creative way and comes from the highest and deepest places inside you.
When emotional feelings tell us that we are no good, that life will never be good again, and so on, we can listen to the inner voice behind and beyond the emotions. And the inner voice will give you illuminating answers very different from what your emotions say. Often these are clear, simple truths which despite their simplicity have the power to revolutionise your life. And they are your truths, not imposed from outside.
One of my highest priorities is to help people find their own inner voice. Once you have found that voice, you don’t need therapy or help in the same way any more. When dark clouds assail you, you can find your own way through to the bright sunlight.
In the same way, the feeling in our body is both a source of joy and delight, and a direct guide to life and how we should move. It is very important to feel. As emotions and tensions are released, the body feels light, joyful and become a doorway to experiencing our inner nature.
When a life situation arises (say, a loss), if you turn towards the facts and accept the truth of the situation, then the emotions which arise (for example the sadness) have a life cycle. When you allow this life cycle, ALL emotions heal ON THEIR OWN. This is the key to healing emotions.
In outline, it really is as simple as explained here. But in everday life, people feel a complex tangle of interlocking emotions:
The art of resolving these can’t be stated in a few words, and almost everyone at first needs outside help. So this section especially is very simplified.
The life cycle of a simple emotion:
The spirit of this is a deep, trusting acceptance. You’re sad and you accept that, you don’t strive to diminish it or change it. You let yourself feel it.
You feel the emotion as a fact about yourself, not about the outside world. For example, you take responsibility for your feelings and think "John's behaviour triggers me to be angry," rather than making John responsible by thinking "I am angry with John because what he does is bad."
When you allow this process, genuine emotions heal on their own. You don’t need to “do” anything. You just feel the emotion consciously, as a fact about yourself, not about the outside world. You don’t need to do anything to change or get rid of the fear, pain, guilt, anxiety, despair. You may perhaps feel you are on an intense emotional roller-coaster. But if you let that roller-coaster carry you, it will bring you to a peaceful place.
For example, you may decide that the anger, say, is pointless and belongs to past time and you let it go, or, you take firm action in the world to get justice. And grief, say, passes and leaves acceptance that life is different from how it had once been.
Guilt, as another example, is mostly a nonsense emotion, a childhood indoctrination, to be got out of your life as quickly as possible and replaced with pride in every aspect of yourself. But sometimes of course, we have in truth wronged someone, and in that case the way out of the guilt is by apology or some kind of reparation.
In this allowing spirit, all experiences whatever flow through you like clouds floating through the empty sky. You are not the experience - not only are you not the painful experiences, you are also not the positive and blissful ones. You are the one who experiences, serene, spacious, vast and peaceful. You are just the observing consciousness, the one who experiences. Emotions don’t last for long and they don’t disturb you too much.
The process of just letting experiences flow through is the universal psychological and spiritual healing process. It heals EVERYTHING. It is the basis of many popular Western psychotherapy and self-help methods, and is the very essence of Eastern meditation.
This is not the only healing process. For example, if you are angry with someone, and then you pause and see things from their point of view, your anger may dissolve in a moment. But the Basic Law of Emotional Healing is the foundational truth on which all other emotional and spiritual healing is based.
Emotions - indeed all thoughts, all manifestations of mind - live on the twin foods of past and future. We get upset because the present isn't the way we expected it to be, because the future scares us or because of pain from long ago which we are still carrying round with us. If you just sit and settle in the present, relax into yourself, and allow your experiences to be just as they are without liking or disliking them, then all thoughts, all emotions just float away. And you yourself are revealed, tranquil and blissful, not limited to any experience, but rather the one who experiences.
Let’s apply some logic, and look the Basic Law of Emotional Healing from another direction.
The Basic Law says that when you accept the truth of a situation, accept the emotion, and allow yourself to feel it fully, then a life-affirming emotion flows though you quite quickly and leaves you either in peaceful let-go or in calm action.
Looked at from the other direction, we get this: any emotion which does not flow through quickly and leave you at peace is not a real, life-affirming emotion. In other words,
is not (any longer) a real emotion. There is no need to feel it.
With a little effort, a little clarity, you can step right out of such stale unhappiness and step right into the present moment of tranquillity and joy.
Obviously, as I've never met you, the reader, I can't necessarily say that for you. But typically, many of the emotions which most people feel are quite un-necessary and by stepping into the present, the person can drop them easily.
Remember, helpful emotions arise from present events or the present discovery of forgotten old pain, and help us to meet reality and to take action. If it doesn't, it is probably time to step into the present and drop it.
PLEASE NOTE. I am not saying to be cold, rational or unemotional! Feelings are life. Some people are easily moved to tears or are firely and passionate. If those emotions arise in the present and flow through, that's beautiful, it is part of the person's individuality and of their process. But stuck, stale, wounded, habitual or defensive emotions are very common - and un-necessary.
To repeat, Nothing here means that you are bad or wrong or inadequate because you feel, or don’t feel, any feeling.
The last thing I want is that anyone feels “Ohmygod – I’m doing life all wrong.” Rule Number One is total self-acceptance: no matter where you are, no matter what you feel, no matter what you are doing with your life, you are totally and unreservedly OK.
When it is too hard to face a difficult emotion, the best way to avoid it is paradoxically to feel another emotion which is also painful, but not nearly as painful as the one we are avoiding. This is of course quite unconscious.
For example, someone who is angry often has behind the anger a feeling of great vulnerability or hurt. As long as they feel angry, they don’t have to feel vulnerable. But the anger is not the real feeling. So they can be angry forever, and often are. Until they feel the hurt, deep healing cannot happen.
For some men, this can be immensely challenging. Boys sometimes grow up in an environment where any expression of weakness or tenderness attracts not just criticism, but physical violence.
Meanwhile, little girls are too often being taught that it isn’t ladylike to shout, or call people names, or hit someone, or be angry in any way. But, they are taught, for little girls crying is just fine. So it is common for women to cry instead of feeling angry. Since the tears are not a real emotion, but a substitute, they will be endless. When the person contacts the underlying anger – and strength! - the tears end so very rapidly.
A key to find what is the underlying emotion is often to ask yourself: What do I need right now? When you directly own the need, whether it is needing respect or affection or to get out of a relationship, then you can communicate clearly, directly and effectively. Feeling and owning our needs is often hard. It can be much easier for one partner in a relationship to be angry when their partner flirts with others, rather than feel and express how painful that is and how they long for security and commitment.
Very strangely, sometimes the difficult “emotion” which we want to avoid is calm peacefulness. Calm peaceful acceptance can be terrifying, so terrifying that we would sometimes much rather feel fear and pain. Calm peaceful acceptance of whatever life is bringing us means that life has changed, that we have to let go of the past, or to act in a new way that takes us into the unknown. This can be so scary that to the unconscious mind, it can seem better to keep hold of the pain – strange to say, but very common.
As a result, many life-delaying emotions have a quality of magic thinking: “If I hurt enough, the painful truth will go away,” or “If I stress enough, the disaster I’m facing will pass me by.” To repeat: only the truth sets us free.
These can build up into a compacted mass of contradictory, painful, forbidden, repressed feelings which take time, patience, trust and courage to un-tangle.
The whole art of healing feelings to move from the everyday feeling down to the earlier one which is behind it, and then the still earlier one which is behind that. When you once feel the deepest root feeling, all the other feelings heal and dissolve at once. Although many therapies today have this structure, it is an ancient technique known as “the trapdoor method” and going back thousands of years.
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If you would like to take a first step to replacing pain with joy, depression with creativity, stress with resourcefulness, give me a ring: 0845-3510604 / 0117-968-7307. My approach is friendly, respectful, and very effective.
Don't hestitate to call directly, I'm happy to answer questions or arrange, in Bristol or Taunton, a free, no-obligation half-hour initial meeting.
Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.
Gautam Buddha
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