We suffer in the denial of what is.
We attempt to change it, deny it, suppress it, hide it, ignore it, numb it – anything to avoid feeling discomfort.
We crave pleasure and have an aversion to discomfort.
Our ‘doing’ is almost always an attempt to move away from pain and toward comfort.
We rarely are still with what is here now.
The pain of unwelcome emotions is the discomfort we choose to avoid.
Rather than feel them or express them, we numb, hide or deny.
We feel we need to do something to be accepted – to fix what we perceive as broken or wrong.
Yet emotions give us information.
They are data.
They are our bodies communicating with us, our felt response to the world around us. We simply need to be more skilled in listening.
Fear – a signal we are stepping into the unknown.
Anger – a signal a boundary has been crossed.
Sadness – a signal that a loving connection is lost.
We feel the pain, the fear, the anger, the sadness – this is our actual experience.
Yet rather instead of being with it, listening to it, accepting and surrendering to it, or attempting to the message – we put on a mask.
We pretend to be okay.
We pretend that we are not moved.
We pretend we are not hurting.
The outside armour hiding our inner vulnerability.
We worry that what we truly feel will be rejected or ridiculed.
So, we hide behind the armour of our doing.
We may have learned that the expression of the emotion brings shame, guilt, embarrassment, or anxiety.
That the emotion itself is somehow wrong.
Yet deep down we know that the doing is only a mask.
We long to be seen for who we are, but somehow, we learned that who we are needs fixing.
That who we are is broken, damaged or wrong.
So, even though we do our best, we still feel that we are not enough.
There is a sense of how we should be.
‘I shouldn’t feel this way.’
‘I should have done better.’
‘I should have outgrown that by now.’
‘I shouldn’t be scared, angry or sad.’
‘I should be happy.’
We suffer in keeping these three aspects apart.
What we actually feel,
what we pretend we feel,
and what we believe we should feel.
The suffering is the effort to deny our being, the resistance to what is present.
‘What we resist persists.’
The cost of masking our emotions is that they are stored in our bodies.
The fear keeps us small.
The genuine anger we feel waits to be unleashed on the undeserving.
The sadness sitting inside of us, the heavy weight of uncried tears.
All getting in the way of a deeper sense of joy, tranquillity, gentleness, peace, and gratefulness.
To be or not to be, that is the question.
To be or to hide ourselves away behind the mask of our doing.
To reveal who we truly are or cling to the armour of our survival strategies.
We are naturally playful, curious and social.
Yet somewhere along the way we learned to take life seriously, to know, to control, to conform, to hide behind a masks that seek the approval of others.
The opportunity is to return to our ‘being’, to come back to wholeness.
Be Courageous – speak the truth of your heart.
Feel the emotions. Let them pass through you.
Reclaim your potential – there is so much more to you than the reactive survival strategies of your doing.
Remember who you truly are. Re-connect. Re-member.
Reclaim what has been lost through old dramas and outdated beliefs.
Shape your future – there is more to life than the patterns you repeat.
Choose to be.
Listen to your emotions.
Respond with awareness.
Trust.
Love.
Enjoy.
Clear view 