Hello,
And welcome to our talk.
Easing our emotions.
I'd like to start with a story of when I first launched Suraflow as a yoga DVD and We decided to create this video as a program to help people.
And when we went to go into production,
I actually wanted somebody else to be videotaped for the DVD.
I did not want to be the main person.
And when coming up with a name for the program,
It was the idea to call it something About my name and this too.
I felt really uncomfortable with I just didn't want to be the center I didn't want to be videotaped And I thought it would just be my voice guiding the instruction.
And of course,
I thought to myself,
What are people going to think that I just called this program my name?
Of course,
I had time to reflect on this and I thought,
Well,
Bikram and Joseph Pilates A lot of these other types of modalities that people name themselves after,
Generally they tend to be men that feel more comfortable naming themselves.
After a modality and when it came time to also launch my book.
It was the same thing.
I had already picked out another title called The Power of Energy Flow,
And I wanted to have a mandala on the cover.
When working with this book team.
They insisted that I call the book,
Sura Flow,
That I put my name on the cover and,
Um,
It was really funny because when I had introduced my book to the CEO of Hay House,
He said,
That is the last thing you should ever do is try to be famous by putting your name and your face on top of the book.
And I just remember going red.
He didn't know,
Obviously,
That that's not what I had originally wanted.
But wow,
Just a huge diss in front of hundreds of people.
That he said this,
Right?
And so of course that's,
That's one of the fears that's there is,
Oh,
I don't want to sound egoic.
What are people going to think about this?
And this was,
You know,
Part of my own journey that I went through.
And I remember somebody calling it reverse egotism.
That,
You know,
When you don't want to be seen and you try to make yourself small,
It's just your ego,
But in reverse,
Your ego that doesn't want to be seen.
And I thought that was such a clever term.
How can we release the fear of what other people think?
Because really what's behind that fear is a feeling of shame.
It's a painful feeling of humiliation or distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behavior.
So it's a painful feeling,
Shame is.
And it's one of those feelings that can really keep us paralyzed and blocked from our true power.
Have you ever thrown negative emotion on top of a negative emotion?
You feel bad about something and then you feel worse because you feel bad about it.
A huge,
Or I think a great example of this is meditation,
Is that when we don't feel we've meditated well enough or been consistent,
We end up feeling bad or guilty or ashamed.
For not having completed our practice.
And that's not really what our practice is for.
To make us feel even worse about not practicing.
But have you ever noticed when you've done this and you've just put more negative emotion on top of feeling bad?
So how can you process shame or any other bad feeling that comes up?
One of the first things you can do is become acutely aware.
Just of how bad you feel.
And you don't even have to do anything about it.
That's one of the first steps in awareness alone.
Has the power to shift anything.
Is I feel bad and I'm making myself feel worse by having these types of thoughts about feeling ashamed or feeling guilty.
And allowing that to have power over me,
Power over my mood and how I feel.
And then if it feels natural,
You can start to move into neutrality with that feeling.
You know,
Feeling the sting of the negative emotion,
Letting it be,
But then finding some neutrality.
And I kind of,
I call this normalizing what you feel because so often we believe ourselves to be special or unique in our bad feelings.
We somehow hold the belief that everybody else is okay with something except for us and that we're the ones with the issue.
So finding a bit of neutrality with whatever you're feeling.
And an example of this is imposter syndrome.
There are people that have really strong imposter syndrome.
We've all experienced this at some point in our life.
And just noticing when those feelings come up of being a fraud.
And seeing if you can just for a moment imagine how many millions of people have experienced the same feeling.
And have still gone on to do great things.
And who are still just as valuable and worthy as anyone else.
So finding a little bit of neutrality or normalization around what you feel.
And then you can even bring in some love.
Because really.
.
.
What transforms a hard emotion,
A difficult experience,
Is kindness and compassion.
And love.
And when we can meet that bad feeling.
With some heartfulness,
Then everything softens.
It's a little less serious,
Rigid.
Tough and we begin to find a new shape with it.
So just bringing in that love and remembering.
Having discipline with love.
In anything that happens.
And then if you want,
You can then create the new imprint or belief that you prefer to have.
So if you're feeling like a fraud,
You can say it.
I'm good.
I'm great.
I'm awesome.
And you get to choose how you think and how you feel.
About anything.
So bringing in that new thought,
Belief,
Imprint feeling is one of your greatest creative powers.
If you can soothe and heal,
Bring to balance your own emotions,
You can do anything.
You will be unstoppable.
Especially if you can master an emotion like anxiety,
Which many of us have suffered from or often can feel.
So just imagine how many emotions we feel in a given day.
They say we have 60,
000 to 90,
000 thoughts a day.
How many emotions do we experience?
Because for every thought,
There's a feeling that's there.
Now think about how many negative emotions you might feel in a day.
And how many positive emotions.
You have and do the negative emotions feel?
Like they carry more weight.
Just noticing without judgment.
Our negative emotions.
That's how we're really going to raise our emotional IQ.
These are the 27 emotions that have been outlined.
I think there is more than this.
And I think also there is some dispute as to the difference between an emotion and a feeling.
So for example,
Shame is not listed here because it's considered a secondary emotion.
But here are some of the emotions we might feel in a given day.
What if you had your own emotional tracker,
Like an inner app,
That tracked your emotions moment to moment?
Imagine that kind of emotional awareness.
And what if you allowed your positive feelings,
Your positive emotions to guide you?
What if that were a barometer for true north in your life?
The feeling of joy.
Bliss.
Peace.
What have you allowed these feelings to guide you?
Have you ever noticed how you feel after you make a decision?
I've always seen for myself that I know I'm making a good decision when I feel peaceful.
And that's my inner barometer.
When I'm really listening to myself,
My heart,
It just feels like ease.
It feels like balance.
There's no tension that's there.
Learning how to listen to your emotions.
Pay attention to them.
Learn how to accept them.
So that you can flow through life a little more easily.
Because when we resist what we're feeling,
We just create more resistance when we throw those hard emotions on top of hard emotions.
So let them take up space.
Let them flow.
You've heard it many times before.
Let them go.
Good or bad,
We all ride the emotional wave.
And just imagine Do you allow yourself to fully feel anything?
Your willingness to feel anything,
Any human emotion.
And a few or two.
Raise your capacity.
To feel that big.
What would happen?
If you no longer felt the need to make an emotion wrong or bad,
Have to suppress it,
Avoid it,
Push it away.
But just allow it to be.
Of fully flow through you.
That's like flowing your full chi.
Through your body and your being.
And just because you feel it doesn't mean that it's you.
It's just energy in motion.
Thank you for listening to today's talk.
Blessings.
Namaste.
