Do you ever feel overwhelmed by or afraid of your feelings?

For a large part of my adult life, I genuinely believed I had no emotions whatsoever.

I had no reactions to anything, no anger, no tears, I was completely calm amidst the chaos.

What I hadn’t realised was I had completely blocked out all my feelings.

For many reasons that I didn’t want to look at.

Underneath my calm exterior I was terrified if I allowed myself to feel anything my life would disintegrate. I would fall apart and never find my way out.

I was afraid my feelings of sadness, pain, loss, grief, anger, betrayal, hatred even, would overcome me, that I would lose my mind, my sanity and simply end up dropping out, not be able to work and from there it would spiral. I would become an irrational dramatic mess, with no friends, no job, no home, no life.

So, I kept a really tight lid on that box, there was no way ANY of these feelings were getting out ever.

The trouble with that is it is a lot of energy, emotion, energy in motion, to contain everyday. When we block the movement of energy inside, hold it in and deny it, our bodies are left to deal with it.

And our bodies deal with any emotions we leave in them in different ways – some insulate and get fat, some starve to starve the feelings, some get sick in an effort to process it, others push it out to the surface through rashes and spots, some go into pain trying to attract our attention as to where that energy is stuck.

Our bodies literally start to yell at us “Hey you, I can’t handle this on my own, I need your help to get it out, you are giving me too much to hold!!!”

If we are lucky, we notice and start to do something.

It took me 15 years to notice what my body was shouting at me. By that stage I was obese, with chronic back and knee pain. And nothing I did on a physical level really made it any better.

Old energy, the feelings I had stuffed down, would attach to any feelings I did have in the moment, in a desperate attempt to get out that old anger would attach to any little bit of irritation I felt, and my responses would be horribly out of proportion to the situation. The slightest little thing, someone driving less than perfectly on the same road as me, and I would feel fury rising. I was leaking all the emotional pain I had chosen not to deal with.

I realised I couldn’t hold in the tears and rage anymore. It took a while of being brave and allowing some of those emotions to surface. I used a journal, I spoke to friends sensitive enough not to judge.

I had made a start but the tsunami was still within.

I used to tell myself over and over again. “I am strong enough to feel this feeling fully”. I took flower remedy’s to surface deep feelings as I got braver and researched emotions as much as I could.

A light came on that I had been denying one of my superpowers all this time.

My feelings weren’t enemies to be fought, but allies in life.

My anger was my guardian at my gates, telling me when my boundaries were being pushed.

My sadness was my signal to wash away the pain, to cleanse, let go and begin again.

My jealousy would show me what I truly wanted and desired to be.

My grief would lead me to great transformation as I buried the old to make way for the new.

And the deeper I went into my own feelings and danced with them I learned they don’t last long when you feel them fully and truthfully. Literally if you go deep they are out in a few minutes.

Once expressed the energy of emotion simply moves on. And so can you.

I learned that by holding my own emotions so carefully, I could enable others to do the same. It allowed me to understand and empathise, deeply, for the first time.

Emotion is a gift; it is the way we connect as humans, to ourselves, to others and to the energies all around us we can sense in any other way.

Without emotions we are not living.

Denying emotions is like denying life.

So today I invite you, wherever you are on your emotional journey to breathe deep, let the breath flow, there is no need to hold anything in anymore and allow what is ever there to be felt to emerge.

Know you are strong enough. Know you can ride your own feelings. And overtime you will become an expert surfer of your own deep sea of feeling.

Know that you are giving yourself a great gift – the gift of truly feeling the sweetness and depth of life itself.

Let me know what you feel, I would love to hear.

Helen xxx