Emotional liberation.
The shift that truly changes everything.
Humans have emotions.
Even to feel numb is a flavor of emotion.
I feel that I don't feel anything.
There's an emotional world within us,
And this world colors the very fabric of our existence.
Imagine your life without emotion.
Without feeling.
Without knowing what love is.
Without the joy of meeting up with a friend for a beautiful moment of shared laughter.
Or without that sense of awe as you watch a sunset paint the sky.
These beautiful emotional moments are the very thing that make being human worthwhile.
Yet,
At the same time,
The gift of emotion can also be the very thing that makes us wish we were never born.
Whatever depth there is for the most beautiful emotions,
There is also the same depth for the painful ones.
There are emotions that give us life and other emotions that strip the breath from our soul.
Is there anything that has happened in your life where the emotional impact was not the biggest gift or struggle?
The emotional compass.
A sacred instrument.
So often,
The reality of emotions takes a back seat to our human experience.
Sure,
We see that they are there.
But in our misunderstanding of what emotions are,
They appear as in the way.
More accurately,
Your inner world of emotions is like a powerful compass.
When we experience intense emotional pain,
We often assume the compass is broken.
Or that it's pointing to something inherently wrong with us.
Actually,
Your emotions are a sacred instrument that guides you toward the most brilliant discovery of your human journey.
When this discovery is seen,
Or embraced,
Your emotional landscape spirals upward into the most profound sense of beauty,
Gratitude,
And love.
Furthermore,
This is the equivalent of a life completely transformed.
Wouldn't you agree that in the absolute core of what you are,
Is a magnetic pole that desires for you to feel positive emotions?
Likewise,
There's something inside that knows negative emotions are somehow not the right path.
The ways we hide.
As everyday humans,
And I really invite you to look at how true this is,
We are inclined to abandon our emotions.
We feel threatened by emotions.
It's not uncommon to spend a life completely hiding from our emotional lives.
This hiding could be in the form of chasing distractions or entertainment,
Consuming substances or foods that numb,
Overworking or staying constantly busy,
Avoiding deeply honest conversations,
Living in the mind,
Analyzing rather than feeling.
These forms of hiding come from an innocent misunderstanding about the nature of emotion.
We don't hide because we're weak or wrong.
We hide because we think hiding is possible.
You see,
It's also innocent.
The mind wants to say in response to negative emotions,
You're doing it wrong.
Therefore,
Something is wrong with you.
This often only invites the deeper hiding.
More accurately,
The truth is,
My dear,
Be still.
There's something you're not seeing and understanding.
The deeper way of hiding.
Again,
It's not because you're wrong or bad.
It's because we are innocently confused.
Blame is the ultimate way of hiding.
Blame isn't so much something we do.
Rather,
Blame is what happens when we misunderstand our experience.
You're not wrong or bad for blaming.
It makes perfect sense why you would.
However,
The more you see a deeper truth about emotions,
Blame and hiding simply become impossible.
When we abandon our emotions through blame and hiding,
We abandon the sacred instrument itself and the gift it's offering.
Blame happens when we assume our inner world is created by the outer world.
I feel XYZ within myself because of what is happening out there in the world.
Therefore,
If I am to feel differently,
Then something out there must be different,
Must change.
Into what I want it to be.
This inner statement without even knowing is the primary way of hiding from the emotional experience.
The downward emotional spiral.
We assume others in the world are creating our inner world,
Which can only have the result of making us their prisoner.
In this assumption,
Misunderstanding,
We are proclaiming that in order for us to spiral upward into the most profound emotional sense of beauty,
Gratitude,
And love,
Something in the world must change.
Often,
Tragically,
This something in the world that must change is you.
Meaning,
You must not be what you are.
Then we fall further into the deepest way of hiding,
Which is the utter abandonment of what you are.
Do you see how the deeper the misunderstanding,
You then spiral downward into the darkest of emotional pains?
Real emotional progress.
The misunderstanding of our emotional landscape is,
In part,
The source of our emotional difficulty.
Therefore,
It makes perfect sense why we could travel through this life not making radical progress in our upward spiral of emotional liberation.
Often,
We notice tiny improvements,
Which are also beautiful,
And worthwhile.
These improvements are a mirror of how deeply you understand the mechanism and opportunity of the emotional landscape.
As a silly example,
It's like building a house.
The more you understand the nuances of house building,
The more effortless and robust the house you build.
Likewise,
The more confusing it is,
The more misunderstandings you have,
Then the journey of house building becomes painfully slow and unnecessarily tedious.
This is self-evident if you're just willing to look honestly.
Emotional progress mirrors a deeper release of blame and being more honest with yourself about what's going on.
This is a deeper understanding of how this whole life thing actually works.
The Conclusion?
To summarize playfully,
If there is emotional pain,
Then there is an innocent misunderstanding.
The emotional pain is not wrong,
Nor is it evidence of you being unworthy or somehow broken.
Emotional pain is a signal.
A signal that says there is an innocent misunderstanding of your human experience.
Such a signal is an invitation to be still and see more deeply what is actually happening.
However,
For most,
That signal becomes a signal that says run away or blame.
My invitation for you here is more about inviting both a gentleness and a deep of courage.
The gentleness is to invite a forgiveness for the innocent misunderstanding.
It's okay.
This is the big shift that invites real progress.
The deep breath of courage,
Though,
Is to take a step out of hiding.
What does that look like?
Being more honest with yourself about the obvious misunderstanding.
Not as evidence that you're broken or somehow less than,
Rather as evidence that there is so much beauty,
Gratitude,
And love waiting for your willingness to show up.
When you're ready,
The teacher will appear.
Practical solutions.
Look,
I'm not a follow these steps kind of guy.
I don't see that as most powerful or real solution.
And often,
They simply become more ways to hide.
The depth of this discovery is not really a side project.
Rather,
It's a radical reframe of how you see yourself and the world.
And this reframe can be more deeply personal and surgical than it is a generic prescription for everyone.
Just do these five things.
The prescription often helps with symptoms,
But doesn't address the underlying issue.
Helping with symptoms can be great,
But it can also help us avoid the thing asking for healing.
In the spirit of that,
Here are five things you can do.
A prescription.
Number one,
Pause before reacting.
Take three deep breaths before responding to create space for clarity.
Number two,
Question the blame story.
Ask yourself,
Is my inner experience really being created by what's out there?
And what do I have to believe about myself for this feeling to be possible?
Number three,
Feel without fixing.
Sit with your emotions for five to 10 minutes without trying to change them or hide.
Number four,
Notice your hiding patterns.
Gently recognize when you're reaching for distractions or busyness.
Number five,
Reframe powerful emotions as signals.
See them as invitations to discover something you're not currently seeing.
Let the emotion show you how you are perceiving yourself in reality,
And then ask,
But is that really true?
Sending you a huge hug.
All is well.
Embrace your journey.
