Simple, Presence, Loving Kindness
I have a friend who is an over thinker. This friend spends many hours a day over thinking. Thinking about the future, about her work, about conversations with friends, about financial security. Hours upon hours upon hours. It takes my friend on an emotional journey ending in anxiety, fear and feelings of being unsafe.
Although my friend is only thinking about her issues, her body thinks she is in a threatening situation. Her overthinking prepares her body for the impending threat. Her sympathetic nervous system is activated. This is the body’s fight and flight system. Simply put, the blood used for digestion is directed to the limbs just in case she needs to fight or run.
My friend’s thoughts have been hijacked by the energy of the emotions. Her neural cortex will start to switch off so the ability to reason will become difficult. She won’t be able to determine a true threat. Everything she witnesses becomes scary.
All this can happen in the matter of minutes. My friend can be sitting watching the ocean with no actual threat in sight other than a toddler with a bucket and spade. I don’t want to invalidate my friend’s emotions as she is experiencing the bodily feelings of a threat. Her body thinks something terrible is about to happen.
In a recent thinking frenzy, my friend called me. It began with the conversation she was having with herself. I interrupted her “so that’s the story, what are you feeling?” guiding her to her body. She felt unsafe. “I’m unsafe” was in her solar plexus like a block.
My friend has had many Self Directed Healing sessions with me and she knew what was coming next. She knew she needed to sit with the feeling, explore it, rumble with the feeling and get curious about the sensation.
My friend is not alone in her overthinking, we all do it. Some more than others and most have no idea that they are doing it, as it is second nature.
During our conversation we talked about how she could get to the root of her thinking without the thinking hijacking her time. We came up with the following words: Simple, presence, loving kindness.
The next day, I was taking my morning walk in the bush and realised my thoughts were taking over my body. Instead of enjoying the experience, I was feeling angry. I was thinking about a recent text message I had received. So, I put into practice what I preach.
As I walked the path this is what I did….
Inhale, exhale, simple. Inhale, exhale, presence. Inhale, exhale, loving kindness… I repeated it a number of times. Then the following came to me….
Simple – forget the story and concentrate on the emotion and energy. This is the “I am”. It may be; I’m scared, I’m unsafe, I’m embarrassed, I don’t care, I’m anxious and in my case I’m angry. You don’t need the story.
Presence – get into the feeling. Give yourself permission to feel. Allow yourself to experience what you are feeling in the moment. You are experiencing unprocessed energy that has been sitting in your body because you were unable to process it before. Processing an emotion takes may forms. Locate the feeling in the body and what does it feel like. Is there a sensation, heaviness, vibration, a hot or coldness. Maybe you see a colour or hear a ping in your ears. Or you could become tired or numb. These are emotions manifesting in the body. Everyone experiences emotion differently and there is no wrong or right. The next step is to hold on to the emotional energy for as long as possible. The sensation will naturally release. For those who don’t like feeling emotions it can be tricky and that’s why Self Directed Healing is so beneficial, we teach you how to feel.
Loving kindness - be kind to yourself, hold yourself and comfort yourself. Try not to judge or blame yourself. Try not to judge or blame others for your feelings. Maybe you will find the source of your emotion lies deep in the past. And that is OK.
Some events in life rattle our emotions and if we don’t deal with the emotions within days it can turn into a mood. A mood if held for weeks and not dealt with, will turn into a behaviour, affecting all areas of our life and wellbeing. Emotions not processed will turn up again and again. This is part of living a life whole heartedly. As a human being we are designed to feel.
For my friend, the over thinking is the symptom of the unprocessed emotion. I checked in with my friend 24 hours later. She had spent the time keeping it simple, acknowledging and with non- judgement, getting present with the emotion and then with kindness, loving herself.
My wish for every human being is for us to feel our emotions. We are all responsible for our emotions and our reactions. I acknowledge terrible things happen to people which we have no control. However, it is up to the individual to look inwards and rumble with their emotions rather than reacting to life and making their emotions the responsibility of others. Feeling is healing and remember…. Simple…. Presence… Loving Kindness.
