The Surprising Relief That Comes From Feeling Your Feelings

Learning to Allow our Feelings

Many, maybe even most of us, are used to trying to avoid certain feelings. We try and push them away, try to ignore them or try to distract ourselves. And that’s understandable - we don’t want to feel the uncomfortable ones, we want to be happy. We instinctively move away from discomfort and towards pleasure, that’s how we are designed. That might work as a short term strategy, but in the long term we need a new way to navigate our feelings.

We are all feeling a variety of emotions every day. Ironically is the exact thing that brings relief is allowing ourselves to experience them fully. It sounds scary doesn’t it, and everything in us says:
Don’t go there. Don’t feel the feeling. It’ll be too much.
Stay in the head. Fix it, manage it, avoid it.

And yet when we do the simplest thing and turn toward a feeling, and stay kind…
It softens.
For some, this happens instantly.
For others, it takes a little getting used to.

That resistance we have to feeling our emotions is ancient, generations of repression and resistance. It's not personal.
It was also how we survived as children when feeling our feelings wasn't safe.
It protected us to hold back, to push them down - maybe when we were small and the environment was unpredictable or explosive.
Maybe it’s what our parents modelled - ignore your feelings, carry on, don’t make a fuss.

So of course there's still a part of you that tenses at the threshold of a feeling.
It says: Don’t let that in. It might swallow you.
But it won’t.
It’s just moving through the body and wants a little bit of attention.

And what if you allow it?
What if you stopped trying to understand it, solve it, or justify it -
and just felt it? Notice where in the body it is felt and turn towards it with curiosity and care. ‘Hello there anxiety, I notice you, there’s space for you, I allow you’. Try it!

You don’t have to give it a name.
You don’t have to like it.
You don’t even have to be brave.

You just have to stop running from it. Lean in towards it a little instead of leaning away from it.
And let it be here, in your chest, your throat, your gut - wherever it shows up.

No thoughts or story.
Just be with it and say hello.

That’s where a welcome shift happens inside, a relief, when we stop resisting what was is here.

A Short Practice: Letting the Feeling Be Here

Find a quiet moment. Sit or lie down. Let your hands rest wherever they want to.

• Let your attention gently drop down into your body.

• Ask: Where do I feel something right now?
  Just notice. A slight tightness? A squeeze? A contraction, a burning sensation, a numbness?

• When you find it, pause there.
  Let your attention rest gently on that spot, like placing a hand on it from the inside.

And say, quietly, inwardly:

“I notice you.”
“You’re allowed to be here.”
“I won’t push you away.”
“I’m just going to stay with you for a little while.”

You don’t need to get rid of the feeling.
Just give it some space. Stay with it without trying to change it.

And if it helps to be guided through it...feel free to contact me. This is a regular practice I do every day with myself and that I share with my clients.

Sometimes that’s all it takes - a few minutes of quiet presence and we see what happens when we stop running and simply listen.