It's not a problem.
It is interesting to notice and wonder where we frame things as “problems” and where we don’t. Where our bodies feel the weight of “problems.” Why “problems” show up in one area of our lives more than others. How we can feel connected and at ease in one place of our lives, and feel fear, anger, or sadness somewhere else. How some issues of the world seem like the most important “problems” of our time and others we hardly notice at all. And how we can turn someone else’s feelings about “problems” into yet another “problem.”
We experience something as a “problem” when we resist it, when we wish something was different than it is. We experience the feelings underneath a “problem” because there is something there for us to learn and heal about ourselves.
We need to practice how to learn from our feelings without creating, and getting caught in, “problems” we think we need to solve.
Now, in December 2021, there are books being banned and censorship of dissenting scientific thought. There are people protesting one kind of threat to bodily autonomy while selectively ignoring/unseeing other threats to other bodies. There are people certain inside their frame of fear who are casting blame on another group certain inside its frame of fear.
We all have big feelings about these layers of issues and many more. What we learn from these feelings is up to us. Our feelings can be opened into deep healing journeys or they can be launched as justification for righteous indignation.
We all find ourselves taking a side and digging in our heals at times, whether it is with a news story, a community issue, a partner, or inside our own minds. We care. We want to help. We have ideas we think will make something better. We want to contribute. We want to belong. We want to love and be loved.
And we all have wounds that live in our shadows. Our feelings, especially feelings that arise around dissonance, are our pathways to help us find these wounds and heal them. This is a healing necessary to dissolve constructs of polarity and open us to all of who we are.
Let’s create an example:
You are in the middle of your day. You notice a feeling. Let’s call it x. You say: “I feel x because of y.” You pick a story to tell: ugh, y, why me?; I am annoyed with y; I wish there was no y; y is wrong; y is mean; y is bad; y is dangerous; must get rid of y; if y would go away, I wouldn’t feel x. The more stories you tell about y, the more you feel x and the more justified you become about feeling x. If you tell stories about y long enough, your feelings of x become tightly bound to your self-identity so any questions/challenges to your stories of y feel like your personhood itself is under attack.
Instead, you could say this: “I feel x.” You think: I have a feeling, maybe it’s a sensation, maybe it’s linked to an unconscious emotion, maybe it’s something else. I am curious. I wonder what this feeling is here to teach me.
Our feelings can be opened into deep, healing journeys or launched as justification for righteous indignation.
You might also be interested in…
The True Story of the Sith by Charles Eisenstein (and all of his writing!)
Imaginal Cells-Be Imaginal, YouTube video from Reboot the Future
The Map of Consciousness Explained by David R. Hawkins
The Places That Scare You by Pema Chodron
Dwellings: A Spiritual History of the Living World by Linda Hogan
In a way, this is mindfulness 101: you are more than your thoughts and feelings. But just because we know about something or practice it in one area of our lives, doesn’t mean we’re done learning about it. There is a lot for us to practice in our noticing of feelings beyond learning to manage them, release them, or unlearn instinctual emotional amygdala triggers.
Feelings are a bountiful ocean of learning… if we choose to jump in.
How we understand our feelings, how we name and tell stories about them, how we listen and explore them, how we accept and love them, how we are curious and learn from them—ultimately determines how we experience everything and how everything in the world responds to this. Do we pause to be curious about our feelings or use them as leverage to project onto others and grow a story around being right?
The thing about pausing to notice and be curious about a feeling is that… it’s a pause, a between time, often buffered by aggressive noise and highly ambitious story-thoughts that like to interrupt to make that pause as small as possible.
What can we do about this? We can notice that it happens. And we can continue to practice ways to honor each pause we take and appreciate each layer of learning along the way, knowing that each time one person takes one moment to explore a feeling instead of turning it into a “problem,” this potentiates high-level, transformative energy vibrations beyond what we can know or measure.
Here are some ways to deepen, extend, and integrate your noticing as daily practice when you notice a feeling (especially one you think might cause your mind to spin).
One minute practices:
Say aloud or in your mind: “Hello, feeling. I notice you. You are welcome here. I am safe. I accept you as you are. I’m busy with something else right now, but you’re fine to stay. I am open to your teachings. Thank you.”
Keep a small feelings notebook. When you notice a feeling, log the date and time. Write a word or two to describe the feeling or draw a little picture of it and where it landed in your body.
Touch the palm of your hand to the place on your body where the feeling currently is (e.g., head, chest, stomach, hip, throat). Focus your full attention to this place and breathe into/out through it three times.
Do nothing. Simply stop what you are doing and let whatever happens with the feeling/s happen. Like you are pausing at an intersection waiting for the walk-light to turn.
Set an intention each morning such as, “Let me notice, honor, and learn from my feelings today without reaction.” Trust in this throughout your day. When you notice yourself noticing a feeling, say, “Thank you.”
Practices for ten minutes (or longer):
Close your eyes. Touch the place on your body where you notice the feeling/s. Set an intention such as “Let me love you and understand you better.” or “Please show me what you want me to see/learn.” or “I am open to all that is possible in this moment.” Let yourself sit and be. Focus your attention on the sensations in your body and notice what happens.
In a notebook, list as many words as you can to describe the feelings/. Don’t write to describe the story, just the physical sensations you are noticing—colors, temperatures, movements, other sensations. If you prefer to draw, draw where the sensations are in your body and how they look/move. Notice what happens.
If your mind is extra interested in stories and can’t seem to escape them, go ahead and write a list of stories… a list of blame and reasons to be right and go on and on until you have nothing left to list. Don’t re-read it. Rip the paper and go outside and burn it (if that’s not possible, tuck it away until you can burn it later). Don’t keep the list lying around. The burning is important.
Sit for a deeper meditation, asking for love and healing. Invite in your spirit guides (or divine help). You may start with holding your hands where you notice the feeling/s, or you might put one hand on your heart and the other on your lower belly. Let yourself set an intention and be. Notice what gifts you receive.
As I write this, I am aware that we teach what we need to learn ourselves. I have been inside a lifetime journey to learn new ways to follow and explore my own feelings. And I can see that the determined righteous indignation of my earlier years (and my entire career as a public-school teacher) was an important part of my journey to get to where I am now. I also know that where I am now is not because of an individual journey. It is because this is where WE are now. My learning is not mine and not for me. This is OUR learning. It is OUR learning because of us and our experiences and feelings with the past and the old energy which is leaving—stories, polarities, us-vs-them, grasping for control, and wanting—so much wanting—to finally be right and win against the wrong.
We have the power (the light and delight) to sit with this wanting and all the feelings that emerge when we try to fight and fix. If every day we’d each notice one urge to react/take a side, and instead decide in that moment to feel into and through the feelings underneath the urge, our world would transform beyond our grandest dreams. Our feelings are what will guide us deeper into ourselves to explore our individual and collective shadows, allowing us to find where we disconnected from ourselves and first began to tell the story that “I am separate from you” instead of I am because you are.
love+light, Melissa
