Emotion is a loaded subject isn’t it? We certainly give it a lot of power. Sometimes it seems that we are subject to our emotions, that they are controlling us especially if they are negative. If we are feeling anxious or sad or mad we let that rule our thoughts and our time and the more attention we pay to it the bigger it gets until anxiousness becomes an anxiety attack, sadness – depression and anger – a full blown rage. In that space we don’t really know that we have the power to control our emotions, it’s like they have a life of their own and they have us by the throat. That’s what I call a spin. By controlling them I am not talking about resisting them, stuffing them down or ignoring them because that will not work. They came to deliver a message and until it is received they aren’t going anywhere and at some point will demand our attention. I am talking about controlling them by controlling our response to them, by neutrally observing them because they carry a lot of valuable information that we can use to empower ourselves.
This is from Ervin Seale’s book – Ten Words that will Change Your Life.
“The true power you have comes from spirit, and its movement is known as emotion. The very word emotion comes from the Latin preposition e – from, and the verb movere, meaning to move. Thus the word (emotion) means motion out from. Emotion is the only real motion you have. Physical motion is reflexive and follows the dictates of the inner motion (or emotion). When anger rises in the breast of an undisciplined man, he is compelled to express it in some fashion, either in the blow of the hand, the kick of the foot, or an explosive word from the mouth. … On the other hand, when love flowers in the human heart it makes a person good all over. It charms away his fears, dissolves his hates, relaxes his tensions and dictates every charitable and magnanimous word and act. It is ideas which give rise to emotions. Every idea in the mind has its corresponding emotion. They are a wedded pair and inseparable. Psychologically speaking, this means that emotion is born out of the structure of the idea or mental concept. This is a truth that anyone can observe for himself. On an individual level one can observe how an unexpected circumstance or a chance remark by another can depress or raise one’s spirits.
People do not realize that Emotion is born of belief and that feeling flows from the central thought of the mind. What you believe and worship (and worship means to count worthy of attention) will awaken and come alive in you as an emotion. If you believe that there are malefic entities in the air or water outside of you which have the power of fastening themselves upon you without your consent, then this belief to you is a source of anxiety and fear whether you know it or not. This belief is a button which pressed under the right circumstances will open the lid of the subconscious where abide all of the emotions, good and bad, and out will come first of all a mild anxiety then will come the more violent emotions of fear and foreboding.”
That’s what I call a spin.
Emotions are messengers coming to show us our beliefs so if we follow our emotion we will be lead to the belief that triggered it. We can consciously do this by first of all not looking at our emotions as enemies whose purpose is to punish us but as messengers and secondly by allowing ourselves to consciously feel them, to have them. This takes us from being their prisoners to their masters. We can detach and become the neutral observer and sit with the emotion having the feelings for the purpose of releasing them and it will lead us back to its beginning. It is like layers of feeling, as we move past one we feel another but it becomes more and more benign and less painful as we follow it. We master it with neutrality, compassion and forgiveness for ourselves. I would venture to say where negative emotion is concerned that the underlying beliefs are lack, fear, limitation and unworthiness or in a phrase – separation from Source. Once we have identified the belief we can work to release it through affirmation and conscious choice. The only way to change our circumstance is to change our belief. How cool is it that we can use our emotions to accomplish this. Our emotions show us our beliefs so let’s use them to heal ourselves.
Deepak Chopra has a great exercise for processing emotion and if I have ever read for you on 12Listen or in person I have probably sent an abbreviated version to you in my list of energetic tools and exercises that I give my clients.
This is a very proactive healing exercise. It is deep work that yields results and brings freedom.
This is from The Book of Secrets- he says;
“Pick a strongly negative experience like:
Road rage
Arguing with your spouse
Resenting authority at work
Losing control over your children
Feeling cheated in a deal or transaction
Feeling betrayed by a close friend
Pick one that has happened repeatedly
Put yourself back in the situation and feel what you felt then. Do what it takes to make the situation vivid in your mind. When you feel that stab of anger, hurt, mistrust, suspicion or betrayal say to yourself, “That’s how my ego feels. I can see why. I’m very use to it. I will go along with it as long as it lasts”. Now, let the feeling run. Get as worked up as your ego wants; envision fantasies of revenge or self-pity, or whatever your ego thinks appropriate. Imagine that you are swelling up with your feeling; it spreads out from you like the shock wave from a slow motion explosion.
Follow this wave as far as it wants to go, watching it grow fainter and fainter as it spreads to infinity, filling the whole universe if it wants to. Take deep breaths if you need to in order the get the wave of feeling to depart from you and travel outward. Don’t time yourself. The feeling may be strong enough to take a while before it wants to expand.
Then just see the wave disappearing into infinity, look at yourself and see if any of the following feelings are present:
A giggle, the desire to laugh
A shrug as if the whole thing is no big deal
A sense of calmness or peace
Looking at yourself as if at another person
A deep sigh of relief or exhaustion
A feeling of release or letting go
A sudden realization that the other person may be right
These are the telltale feelings that arise in us when we are crossing the invisible boundary between ego and the real self. “If you follow any emotion far enough it will end in silence.”
This is a powerful exercise that I have used many times and I know from personal experience if you follow any emotion far enough it will end in silence but you have to be willing to follow it and that takes self-love and courage.
Namaste’
The above article is an excerpt from my radio show Empowerment which aired July 15, 2014. You can download it from the archives on 12Radio.com
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