Feeling All Your Feelings: A Life Coach NYC's Guide to Embracing the Good, Bad, and Ugly

“All your feelings need to know they matter, all our feelings need to be heard, and all our feelings have a right to be acknowledged.”                                                     ---Jessica Baum 

Do you ever find yourself resisting feelings that you know are there but you’d rather not deal with? Do you have trouble letting go of the past and the emotions it brings up?

We all have this, to some extent. Part of being human is having a variety of emotions, what we may call the good, the bad and the ugly.

In our present society and culture of constant communication and updates, we tend to see and to show mostly the good or positive parts of our lives (whether they’re true or real or not). We have a harder time, not only admitting, but showing that we have negative thoughts (shadow side), too. This can cause us to ignore or push down these ‘shadow’ sides of us.

We may suppress what we call ‘negative’ emotions, beliefs and thoughts. We may also try to distract from them with too much alcohol, sex, substance abuse, social media scrolling and other avoidance techniques. We don’t necessarily do this consciously but it’s important to become consciously aware that this is what we’re doing, and to change paths to consider and embrace acceptance of ALL our emotions: joy, sadness, anger, pain, rage, peace……………

You may have heard the expression, ‘You have to feel it to heal it.’

It’s true; the more you avoid feeling all of your feelings, even the ones you don’t like or want, the more you’ll feel them. In other words, they will persist.

Another phrase you may have run into, ‘What you resist persists.’

So, the more we resist those deeper, often harder, often painful feelings that may be buried deep inside, the more they linger with us and affect our thoughts and lives, often in a negative way. They weigh us down and don’t allow us the space for the positive, the joy, inner peace and authenticity that we are and that we deserve.

It turns out that the way to work through and subsequently, heal the pain inside, is to do the inner work and to feel the emotions and pain. We don’t want to do this because it’s not pleasant; it doesn’t feel good and our society tells us to show only our ‘positive’ emotions. Also, the unknown is scary. We don’t know what we might find or discover.

As a Life Coach NYC and Mindset Mastery expert, I’ve learned and let my clients know to:

Let your feelings and emotions, the good, the bad and the ugly, wash over you. You may need to cry a lot or hit a pillow or bed (not a person) or scream. Feel it………….feel the pain of your parents, family, caretakers who may have neglected you, ignored you or abused you and those who may be doing it now.

It may even be that you’ve internalized what you were taught, perhaps that ‘you don’t deserve love,’ that you’re not smart, pretty, nice or (fill in the blank) enough.

No matter what it is, you can’t escape the inner work, not with any addiction or drug or avoidance tactic that’s going to take you further and further away from you.

The idea is to get closer and get to, intimately, know the whole, beautiful, authentic, amazing and fabulous, real YOU, the you that encompasses both the pain and the joy, the dark and the light.

As the late and great songwriter, Leonard Cohen, wrote and sang, in the line in his song, “Anthem:”

“Ring the bells that still can ring, forget your perfect offering, there is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.”

It’s the darkness, of difficult, painful feelings, experiences and situations that allows you to see some light and allow it in. With this light comes more peace, centeredness, knowledge of the true you and more empathy and compassion, for both yourself and for others.

It’s time to accept the darkness; the painful, uncomfortable and scary emotions we’ve been hiding and hiding from, especially from ourselves. It’s time to feel the shadow side (darkness), accept it, embrace it, with all the vulnerability it entails, so that you can heal it and keep it at your fingertips to use as lessons for your life and perhaps even, to help others in theirs.

The more you give yourself permission and the more you feel ALL your feelings, the faster you can accept and absorb them into your life and move into the life that you really desire. This vulnerability and foray into the darkness (or shadow side) and feeling your negative emotions, is a catalyst that gives you the strength and the ability to see your true inner power and to move forward. You no longer stuff these emotions down. You let them out, release them.

Et voila, change occurs (a positive thing)!

You’ve heard that ‘the truth sets you free.’ When you know the truth of ALL your feelings and accept, absorb and really understand them, then you’re free. You can be who you really are. You have personal power, along with inner peace, emotional stability and an understanding of others that will improve your relationships.

In other words, doing this inner work and learning how to feel ALL your feelings, changes you and your life, for the better. It’s a game-changer. It lets in the LIGHT!

With smiles & love,

Dr Gigi

PS: To learn more about doing this life-changing inner work,

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