201: Feelings are Beings

Are feelings like objects, like forces, like waves, like eruptions? The metaphors we use for what we feel profoundly shape how we'll respond to them. Should we let them pass, push them away, be overwhelmed by them? Or, as we consider in this conversation, perhaps we could treat them as beings in their own right, with their own kind of intelligence, sensitivity, commitments, and ways of relating to the world. When we see our feelings and the feelings of others this way, we become more inclined to be curious, to listen, to bear witness.

This week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about ways we can include what we might ordinarily try to dominate, ignore or push away, hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

Here's our source for this week:

Since I've been a child, I've been in an antagonistic relationship with an important part of myself. I have consistently tried to ignore, repress, or force my feelings away. I have tried to create unnatural feelings or force away feelings that were present.

I've denied I was angry, when in fact I was furious. I have told myself there must be something wrong with me for feeling angry, when anger was a reasonable and logical response to the situation.

I have told myself things didn't hurt, when they hurt very much. I have told myself stories such as "That person didn't mean to hurt me"... "I need to be more understanding". The problem was that I had already been too understanding of the other person and not understanding and compassionate enough with myself.

I have tried to use spiritual energy, mental energy, and even physical exertion to not feel what I need to feel to be healthy and alive.

Emotional control has been a survival behaviour for me. I can thank that behaviour for helping me get through many years and situations where I didn't have any better options. But I have learned a healthier behaviour - accepting my feelings.

We are meant to feel.

Part of our dysfunction is trying to deny or change that. Part of our recovery means learning to go with the flow of what we're feeling and what our feelings are trying to tell us.

We are responsible for our behaviours but we do not have to control our feelings. We can let them happen. And we can learn to embrace, enjoy, and experience - feel - the emotional part of ourselves.

Melody Beattie, from 'The Language of Letting Go'

Photo by Ahmad Odeh on Unsplash