For years I didn’t really make time to feel big emotions. I was regularly in the halls of Congress chasing politicians down and sharing how US foreign policy was destroying millions of lives. And yeah, I was pissed and sad and disillusioned and ragey. But I had shit to do (protests to organize, emails to send, a half-dozen anti-war coalition conference calls to be on at any given moment), so there wasn’t a lot of room to feel.
I figured I’d do it (aka feel my feelings) later. But I didn’t, really. At the end of each day I was exhausted. When I had a day off, I distracted myself. I tried to have “a life” with my friends, partner, drinking, eating, 20-somethinging in NYC.
I was literally too busy too feel. I know now that being too busy is a way to avoid experiencing uncomfortable emotions. Imagine that. Can you relate, dear one?
So now that I’ve made it my business life to slow the eff down in service of balancing out the fractured masculine of our society with some divine feminine energy, I FEEL A LOT.
And these last few months of the Supreme Court hearings, Dr. Ford’s testimony, the sham FBI investigation + Venus going retrograde (oh, hello feels) has felt like an emotional fucking gauntlet.
Because RAGE VOLCANO. Because age-old feelings of rejection and abandonment and dismissal of our inherent value.
Because accepting darkness (meaning accepting that it exists, not surrendering to it or the expressions of it in others) can sometimes be hard for an optimist.
Rage and anger are not emotions that most of us are at all comfortable with.* As humxns we try our best to feel safe, stable, certain and secure. We learn that rage, anger, sadness, basically any emotion that has been deemed “dark” is unstable, unvaluable, and will untether us = bad.
Truth is that all emotions have value. They all have information for you! For instance, anger is a result of a boundary being crossed. Think of times when you get angry and see if you can locate the violated boundary (physical, emotional, mental, psychic, spiritual). Make sense?
To allow the emotion to move through you and not get stuck and compacted in your psyche (= anxiety and disproportionate responses to situations where you transport from the present moment into past hurts and traumas), you gotta acknowledge it. Make space for it. Say, “Oh hey, I see you rage and I get why you’re here.”
Because when we resist our emotional reality all we do is create agitation and suffering.
Author and activist Glennon Doyle (and I’m sure others) says, “You can’t have courage without rage.” And I believe that’s true. Once you begin to acknowledge your emotions you can work with them — including rage!
Transmutation is possible. Energy is energy. Allow your deep psychological experiences to transform into drivers of your own magnificent evolution (yours + mine + everyone else’s = our collective evolution!).
ASK YOURSELF //
Are you resisting your emotions right now? Can you slow down and soften with yourself a bit to feel them a little more? Is there a fear of feeling them? Talk to that part of you that’s afraid and see if you can empathize and coach them forward.
Feeling is healing, my sweet little acorn.