What does it truly mean to feel your feelings?

On the spiritual path, allowing your feelings to come through to be fully felt is often touted as the be-all end-all of processing and healing. Yes, it is essential! However, most people I witness are not doing this in a way that catalyses their self-realization. For most people it is simply a release to keep the energy flowing and not become stuck. This is okay in and of itself, however, in order to learn, heal and self-realize from it we have to learn how to approach the process in a conscious way

Often, especially among highly sensitive people, I witness a slight confusion - "But Richard, I'm constantly feeling my feelings. All I seem to do is be emotional and it never seems to get me anywhere. I'm in constant process!"

Here's the thing. JUST feeling is not enough.

​What most people do when they 'go into' their emotions is get stuck in a subtle victim consciousness or endless thought loops. The victim is very good for the ego because it absolves you from taking responsibility for healing. Endless thought loops keep you from truly moving the energy - they keep you in automatic pilot.

How to tackle emotions in a conscious way

It's all about giving them space without losing yourself in them.

The key is feel them on a purely energetic level without labeling them as this or that or getting lost in the story that caused them. Watch how it presents in your body. What is tightening? Allow the energy to flow through you intuitively through crying, shouting, moving or adopting a position. Then watch to see how it changes.

If you can do it this way, by remaining focused on the energy itself, then something will always move.

But that's not all!

Then we have to look out for a new way of being that might be activating. What wants to come through now? Perhaps it's a fresh or deeper pain - that will have to be unraveled too. Or perhaps you're being invited to express in new, more aligned way.

Feel your wholeness - that feeling inherent in your being when you let go of the story. Ask yourself, "what outcome have I been attached to?" Then feel how to express from the wholeness. This way, anger could turn into passion. Guilt could turn into compassion. There will always be a key to activating this way of being. Perhaps that's a feeling of surrender and acceptance, or determination and focus, or curiosity.

Then watch how the new expression forms and what it creates in your environment.

That is how to feel and heal. It becomes a constant movement. A constant discovery. And life moves!

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