Whether it’s facing the grief from an unexpected loss, anger on the painful words of somebody near us, or the resentment of not asking for what we’d like, all of us experience difficult emotions. Each of those moments impacts us on an emotional, mental, and physical level.
Once we don’t process the emotions that arise during these difficult times – resembling anger, rage, grief, panic, or guilt – they’ll shape our perceptions and behaviors for years or a long time to come back. Something might trigger an old unconscious memory, carrying with it an emotion that makes us uncomfortable, stressed, anxious, or upset. Without cultivating mindful awareness, being with such emotions can leave us feeling overwhelmed or powerless.
So is it possible to learn to satisfy our emotions with compassion relatively than turning away from them so we don’t create more unnecessary pain for ourselves?
World-renowned psychologist, Dr. Gabor Maté, suggests that the trail to healthy emotional well-being begins with mindfulness and healing our relationships. Here, we provide key takeaways from a recent Mindfulness Exercises podcast episode where Sean Fargo chats with Dr. Gabor Maté to bring insights into healthy ways to deal with the range of inauspicious emotions that naturally include being human.
How do emotions impact your well-being?
Every emotion you’re feeling plays a very important role in keeping you healthy. This includes the emotions that could be hard to feel or express resembling anger, fear, shame, or guilt. Contrary to what lots of us have been taught, these emotions weren’t meant to be repressed or pushed away. Somewhat, they’ll develop into a present to be certain that your needs are met so you’ll be able to truly enjoy each precious moment more fully.
Dr. Gabor Maté likens your emotions to a gatekeeper that functions like your body’s immune system. On the physical level, the immune system is designed to let in what’s nourishing and keep out what isn’t. On the mental level, your emotions let you recognize what helps you thrive and what could also be toxic to your well-being.
Take the emotion of anger, for instance. Anger has a very important role in helping you set and implement healthy boundaries. When someone is hurting your feelings, it’s only natural that you just don’t need to be exposed to their intrusive attacks. So anger lets you recognize that it’s time to take motion and rise up for what you would like or need from the situation.
Just as you wouldn’t tolerate someone hurting you physically, anger is the primary indicator that something may have to be done to stop one other person from further hurting you emotionally. That is crucial to caring to your well-being so you’ll be able to feel protected going through life without closing off your heart.
“Intuitively everyone knows that it’s higher to feel than to not feel. Beyond their energizing subjective change, emotions have crucial survival value. They orient us, interpret the world for us and offer us vital information. They tell us what’s dangerous and what’s benign, what threatens our existence and what’s going to nurture our growth.”
Anger, rage, panic: to maintain it in or let it out?
Throughout his a long time of research, Dr. Gabor Maté has found that rage, panic, and grief are amongst probably the most suppressed emotions. Yet this suppression weakens the immune system and may result in a variety of physical illnesses.
Rage and anger are a part of our mammalian brain and system for a reason. They signal us to guard ourselves from those that threaten us so we will proceed to survive as a species. So why does it feel a lot easier to suppress these feelings than to specific them?
Once we feel emotions like anger, rage, panic, or grief, there’s an innate fear that expressing them could threaten a relationship. And as human beings wired for social connection, the last item we wish is to alienate someone.
Unconsciously, we frequently do whatever we will to seem to others in the very best image possible – even when this implies foregoing our own needs and desires. This will easily turn into lifetime habits of people-pleasing, unhealthy behaviors, and addictions.
The excellent news is that emotions like anger, rage, panic, and grief may be addressed in a way that permits us to expand our self-awareness without suppressing them. And mindfulness is an excellent place to start out.
Turning toward difficult emotions with mindfulness
If you practice mindfulness, you develop into more conversant in the landscape of your inner self. The thoughts, feelings, and beliefs that will once have been unconscious start rising to your awareness. By noting their presence without judgment, you construct the power to be with what’s, even when it feels difficult.
Every emotion has a physical sensation related to it. Some emotions may feel hot or bring a tightness to your chest while others generate a way of unease in your belly. Mindfulness practices just like the body scan let you notice the sensations that arise within the body so you’ll be able to feel protected witnessing their presence.
Through mindfulness, it’s possible you’ll discover that when you notice anger or rage, you are usually not the anger or rage itself. You might be the attention that’s doing the noticing. Somewhat than ignoring such difficult emotions, mindfulness permits you to bring a young and loving awareness to them. This opens up an area where you’ll be able to be with them more fully.
Overwhelmed with emotions? Try compassionate inquiry
As you practice mindfulness of emotions, it’s normal to initially feel a way of overwhelm. If you feel this or have an urge to maneuver away out of your emotions, compassionate inquiry may also help. It moves you closer to the guts of what could also be causing certain reactions or feelings to surface.
Developed by Dr. Gabor Maté to assist people feel greater emotional freedom, permits you to have a look at what you’re feeling and develop into curious as to why you’re feeling that way. This practice deepens your level of self-awareness and may assist you cultivate more self-compassion.
To practice compassionate inquiry, first acknowledge the emotion that’s arising. Is it anger, rage, frustration, shame, guilt, blame, grief or something else? Then, do an inquiry on this emotion. Ask yourself questions resembling:
Be together with your answers without judging or analyzing them. Simply notice what comes up. Recognize that you just are usually not the emotions which are causing you pain. You might be the one who’s uncovering them. This practice builds your muscle of awareness so you can be present with what arises (inside and out of doors yourself) without getting too overwhelmed or caught up by it.
The more often you do the compassionate inquiry, the more mindful you develop into. The more mindful you develop into, the more you’ll have the opportunity to note anger (or one other difficult emotion) arising without acting on it or without feeling powerless over it.
Find out how to be kinder to yourself amidst difficult emotions
In a culture that usually touts positivity, it could feel as if we shouldn’t be having negative emotions. Yet this concept itself then causes us to guage ourselves for feeling our emotions and should result in spiritual bypassing. So how do you get out of the loop of judging yourself for emotions like anger, rage, grief, or panic so you’ll be able to feel them and work through them in a healthy way?
First, Dr. Gabor Maté suggests recognizing that judgment is an automatic process. We don’t consciously resolve to guage ourselves…yet we then judge ourselves for judging ourselves.
As you notice self-judgments arising, say to yourself something like “Oh, there’s a judgment about myself having a judgment. I notice that it’s happening for me right away.” When you’ll be able to see this, recognize that you just’re not the one doing the judging. This practice helps you additional strengthen your awareness in order that judgments will develop into less automatic in the longer term.
Strong boundaries and self-care for lasting emotional well-being
Lots of our difficult emotions are a result of inauspicious or traumatic experiences from our past. We are able to’t change the undeniable fact that those experiences happened. As a substitute, we will decide to feel and acknowledge them after which resolve what to do about them.
“We might not be liable for the world that created our minds, but we will take responsibility for the mind with which we create our world.”
Most significantly, we all the time have the ability to shape our future emotional well-being by taking excellent care of ourselves in each present moment. To cut back the instances of feeling resentment or anger, Dr. Gabor Maté suggests practicing personal self-care and setting healthy boundaries.
Learn the way to apply these insights to your relationships and the way to handle the guilt that will initially arise when standing up to your needs. Take heed to the complete episode of this Mindfulness Exercises podcast with Dr. Gabor Maté by clicking below.
