How to address repressed emotions during meditation
When you start your mindfulness journey there is so much to try to think about. First how to breathe and then how to sit, where to make the time and so on; that perhaps we completely lose sight of our goals. It reminds me of when I first started scuba diving, with all the checkpoints and things to remember, my first few dives I was completely obsessed with getting everything right. I was so obsessed in fact that I barely even noticed the things around me. I was literally 90 feet underwater with a 15 foot Goliath grouper and sharks surrounding me on a shipwreck and all I could think about was checking my air levels and keeping protocol. Of course this is completely normal when we are learning something new. Getting bogged in the details can help solidify habits at first, but we need to come back from these details and remind ourselves of why we started in the first place. I would like to encourage you not to be so tied down to the details that you lose sight of the journey and what these meditation times are bringing for you. A lot of beautiful things can happen and self discoveries be made that you may completely miss if you are too focused on perfection. Really this advice can be said about life in general.
One of the things that may come up as we are learning to practice mindfulness is emotions from the past that we have repressed for so long. By allowing our minds to be open and without distraction we are allowing our subconscious to finally take a forefront and alert you on the emotions that have been affecting us for years, but we have not allowed ourselves to formally experience. When these emotions come up it can be sudden and strong but also just a subtle whisper. It is important that when these emotions do show themselves that we allow our minds healing and accept with open minds what is being shown to us. So for today's exercise in mindfulness we are going to explore what to do and how to best address emotions as they come up in our exercises.
To begin, start with your mindful breathing, closing your eyes or focusing on an object. Give yourself several cleansing breaths before you commence the scan of your body. Starting with your toes, working your way up through your body towards the crown of your head, feel each part of your body. Feel the blood circulating, the hot or cold of each part, note any pain or discomfort you have and just feel your body in this moment, in this space, in this time. Once you have come to this state if emotions are starting to come up, let them come. Welcome the emotions good or bad, but focus on one at a time. As an emotion starts forming in your mind, pay attention to how your body feels. Does your pulse change, temperature change? Do you feel pain or discomfort in a part of your body? Is the pain you feel a pain you feel throughout your daily meditations and life? Continue with your mindful breathing and stay in your present moment and acknowledge the emotion. Emotions are not good or bad, they simply are. Feel the emotion in your body, take note of what changes and feel the full range of this emotion.
If you feel ready, you can take on another emotion you are feeling, if you are feeling exhausted already, you may end here. When you have completed exploring the emotions of the day you are ready to end the mediation. Give yourself a few cleansing breaths and let yourself feel the moment with your new personal knowledge. Stay here as long as you need and when you are ready open your eyes. You can access this exercise anytime you feel emotions coming up in your daily meditations. If you are not experiencing any emotions when you practice daily though I encourage you to allow yourself to explore them. If emotions are not distracting you at the beginning of your practice you could be someone who represses your emotions, which is just as damaging as being ruled by them. Think on a particularly strong emotional experience and let yourself feel these emotions. With practice you will start to feel the emotions as they happen without fear but just open acceptance of the message they are trying to give you.
Perhaps you are wondering why you should thank an emotion, especially a negative one. The truth is all emotions are our mind's attempts to protect and help us. These emotions show up as a way to warn us just like pain when we cut ourselves, our happiness when we eat something we enjoy. The problem with emotions lies when we repress them or let them control us. We must find balance between letting our emotions communicate with us while not being blind followers or completely apathetic towards them. Because of this, we thank all our emotions but let them pass. The message has been received, it is now up to us to make the change. Often we are afraid of emotions and what they can do to us and it can be easy to stuff them away until we explode, or ride the tide of them for the adrenaline and courage but end up going too far.
The point of accessing emotions in meditation is to take the time to truly learn our emotions so we can understand them when they come into our lives. Perhaps a sudden stomach ache is a sign of excitement for you or maybe a headache in the back of the neck is a sign of being overwhelmed If you can identify these pains as having emotions tied to them you will be able to handle yourself better. Even if you do not feel those emotions specifically, if you feel one of these physical signs you can know that as an emotional response. With this self knowledge we become stronger individuals that not only are able to react better to the world, but also are able to be better friends, spouses, workers and humans.
How have you connected with your emotions during meditation? What do you struggle most with? Reach out to us at info@bullionite.com with your questions or comments.