dear friend,
Emotions are powerful: they can keep us grounded and happy even when the world around us is challenging. They can also leave us feeling miserable even if everything in our life seems wonderful. We’ve all experienced this disconnect; days when you toggle between the upswing of positive emotions followed by crashing negative feelings regardless of what’s happening in your external life. And even though we all live with delight and misery and everything in between, most of us spend very little time thinking about the role we play in our own emotional state. It’s like we all know that it’s a good idea to check the weather before heading out for the day, but we don’t because it’s too much of a hassle. And then we get caught in a downpour without an umbrella.
Of course, getting real about handling our own emotions is little more challenging than checking our phone to see if it’s going to rain. Most of us know that it’s possible to be more skillful, but we don’t because getting real with emotions is hard. Pleasant emotions are fine, but dealing with the emotions we dislike, the ones that make us feel miserable at our own birthday party, those emotions are scary. They bring us back to moments of shame, regret, grief, whatever-you-really-would-rather-not-feel. So, we do what limits our discomfort: ignore our suffering until it’s impossible to ignore…and then most of us still do nothing because, well, what is there to do?
A lot. We all have both the power and agency to gently navigate emotional weather patterns with skill, compassion and wisdom.
I have yet to meet someone living a truly peaceful and happy life who ignores and suppresses everything they don’t want to feel. Have you? Still, so many of us return to some variation of ignoring what we don’t want to feel over and over again. Me included! We distract ourselves with buying the latest thing or experience. We numb ourselves with scrolling, shopping, traveling, eating, taking mood-altering substances. We find someone to blame or resent so that we can only feel the heat of righteous indignation or straight-out rage. The list of distractions is a long one.
And no matter what we do, we end up in the same place. The strategies don’t work longterm because our emotional state is not a problem. Our emotions are simply emotions. They may be unpleasant or pleasant or neutral, but they don’t force us to be or do anything unless we choose to let them. Trying to control our outer world in order to avoid emotional states makes as much sense as thinking that the way to avoid getting caught in the rain is to make sure it’s always sunny.
Even if it were possible to create endless cloud-free days, if you’ve ever lived through a drought you know that sunshine every day isn’t such a good idea. The same is true of our internal weather patterns — cue “The Rainy Day” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. None of us benefit from avoiding everything that makes us feel uncomfortable. Once we accept that being human means having feelings that are sometimes unpleasant, the real challenge becomes clear: How to skillfully handle our emotional weather.
There are a lot of great resources out there for feeling tone/Vedanā practices, but if you want to jump in and get started this week, here’s my quick and simple introductory practice to reconnect with your own inner emotional wisdom.
Start with feeling your own sense of gentleness: Feeling gentle toward your own emotions, especially feelings like shame or envy or regret, is key because it’s a tender way to be with feelings we find unpleasant. Once you’re feeling a gentle warmth toward yourself, start with the practice:
1. Sense emotions as they arise. Most of us become aware of emotions when they start to take hold in our body. I tend to feel shame and regret in the pit of my stomach. Envy and jealousy usually live in my chest. Anger likes to tighten my jaw. This step is about learning your own patterns. When I first started, my jaw could be so tight that massaging it was actually painful, but over years of practice, I now can sense that tightening well before any physical discomfort. Don’t try to do anything with the emotion. Don’t tell yourself you shouldn’t be feeling this way. Don’t beat yourself up for feeling something you label as “bad.” This step is all about learning to sense what it happening as it unfolds. Give yourself credit every single time you are aware…if that is one solitary moment during an entire week or if it’s five times in five minutes.
2. Identify the emotion as pleasant, unpleasant or neutral. In our head-centric world, most of us have been trained to come up with stories to explain why we’re feeling what we’re feeling. That tangles us up with our emotions. Instead, take a moment to pause and get curious: Is the emotion you’re feeling pleasant, unpleasant or neutral? This step is important because it accomplishes two critical things: (1) you gain distance from the emotion because in asking the question about the feeling, you are reminded that you are more than the feeling; and (2) you ground yourself in the present by remembering that you are sensing a thing that is happening right now. One of the lovely things I learned in this step is how often I actually have emotions that feel pleasant that my brain told me I shouldn’t like: taking a walk in Central Park on a gray day with a light drizzle is thoroughly pleasant for me even though my brain tells me that I shouldn’t like no sunshine and the chance of getting wet. Try it out. You may be surprised by what you discover.
3. Hold your emotion in gentle awareness. When you first start reconnecting with your emotional wisdom, this step will be fun with pleasant emotions. You get a nice card from your grandma, you sense happiness and connection. Instead of immediately moving on to the next distraction, wait for a moment, and hold that love for your grandmother in your awareness. After you’ve done this a few times, try the same with neutral emotions. You’re waiting in line at the grocery store. It’s neither pleasant nor particularly unpleasant. As you hold that neutral feeling in gentle awareness, you notice that you don’t need constant stimulation in order to simply be at peace with what is. You are reminded that all things pass because no matter how long the line, you will eventually get your groceries. Finally, you’ll try this step with unpleasant emotions. You’ll get a text from someone who is not your favorite person. Instead of jumping to stories for all the (legitimate?) reasons you don’t like this person, you can be aware of the unpleasant sensation and say to yourself: I know this doesn’t feel great right now, but it’s okay. And it’s also okay that I don’t really like this person. There’s more to me than the awareness of this one unpleasant sensation. Every time you want to blame or complain about this person, gently bring yourself back to the moment without words. Breathe. When I struggle with this, I will actually say: “I intend to not get caught up in my stories about the feelings I associate with this person.” This may not be the most advanced method for handling unpleasant sensations, but it’s a gentle step in a more skillful direction.
4. Let it pass. Learning to skillfully navigate the weather of emotions isn’t easy, at least not for me. But with practice, it becomes part of you, and when you learn to be with it all before acting — before yelling at the flight attendant, before sending the snarky text, before blurting out that thing at the family dinner that cannot be unsaid — you’ll be cultivating the equanimity and the gentle superpower of holding your emotions in a larger and open space that is your wiser and more compassionate self.
And that’s it for this week! Wishing you all the best in this gentle adventure.
warmly,
alison
