The importance of "feeling" when it's tough

[Family Court Strategies: When Your Partner Has BPD OR NPD Traits.]

I tried an experiment this morning.

Sometimes I have tough days and the suffering lingers.

Today was going to be one of those days, so I gave myself 5 minutes of unjudged "feeling" time. To express my pain, anger, injustice, shame. At the end of 5 minutes I wasn't done so it did it again for 5 minutes. This time I really felt intensely. But I still wasn't done. I did it 5 times (25 minutes)

And then it was all out. All of it!

And guess what? I started to have "thriving" feelings and thoughts. Really positive ones about my day.

I'm raising how important Step 2 of detaching is. "Find a way to explore your feelings that allows you to both be present with them, and to stand a little aside from them

Wow!

[Moselle]

I tried an experiment this morning.

Sometimes I have tough days and the suffering lingers.

Today was going to be one of those days, so I gave myself 5 minutes of unjudged "feeling" time. To express my pain, anger, injustice, shame. At the end of 5 minutes I wasn't done so it did it again for 5 minutes. This time I really felt intensely. But I still wasn't done. I did it 5 times (25 minutes)

And then it was all out. All of it!

And guess what? I started to have "thriving" feelings and thoughts. Really positive ones about my day.

I'm raising how important Step 2 of detaching is. "Find a way to explore your feelings that allows you to both be present with them, and to stand a little aside from them

Wow!

[Larmoyant]

Hi Moselle, I might have tried this in a small way yesterday. I had a crying fit and at first tried to stop the tears and push all the feelings away, but instead let it all come out and 'watched' myself as it all unfolded. After a while I stopped and decided I'd suffered for those tears and was allowed to feel that way and now it was time to do something else. Not sure if this is what you mean, but I definitely felt better. 

[Sadly]

Hi Moselle
This is a good thing to read. I also floundered a bit yesterday after receiving a text from my ex. I didn't reply but it upset my equilibrium for a while. I cried a lot, thought of good and bad times, cried some more and then felt a bit stronger. Then I read my Elephant story and laughed. Will try this allowing yourself to feel timespan thing again. Thank you   x

[Imnotalone]

Interesting

[bus boy]

Moselle, that is great. It's always good to read a good feeling post. Embrace the good feelings.

[heartandwhole]

Well done, Moselle!

I think your post actually makes a very profound point, that all of us can learn from. I would go so far as to say that almost all emotional dysfunction, from "normal neurosis" to addiction to the PD spectrum occur in large part to the unwillingness or inability of people to  feel what is going on in their bodies and minds.  Think how often we try to distract ourselves from feeling what we don't want to feel; how we chase pleasure and shun discomfort.

If each one of us would just take those first 5 minutes, like you did, to feel the sensations in our bodies and eventually explore the beliefs that go with them, I think this world would be a different, more compassionate, and happier place.

And guess what? I started to have "thriving" feelings and thoughts. Really positive ones about my day.

This is so important. If we are regularly shutting down uncomfortable feelings, we will not be able to access the pleasant ones. Emotional health doesn't work that way; we can't selectively suppress. When we close down the "negative" stuff, we close down the "good" stuff, too—leaving us not hurting, that's true, but not feeling joyful or thriving, either.

Thanks for showing us how it's done, Moselle. Keep up the good work!

heartandwhole

[bestintentions]

Moselle - can you give us more color on how you expressed yourself?  Always looking for new methods... .thx

bi

[amsheehy]

Moselle - can you give us more color on how you expressed yourself?  Always looking for new methods... .thx

bi

x2!  I'm curious as well.

[Moselle]

Moselle - can you give us more color on how you expressed yourself?  Always looking for new methods... .thx

Hey BI,

There wasn't much to this actually. (I've done focussing before, using a book by Anne Weiser Cornell which I highly recommend, so that might have helped me. I've done 10-12 structured focussing sessions in the past 8 months). It addresses a little bit of what heartandwhole mentioned "the unwillingness or inability of people to  feel what is going on in their bodies and minds".

I felt bad about a number of things, so I had an internal dialogue about each of them. eg frustration and anger around being alienated from my children by the ex. I really just said "I am very #@$% $%^& ing viciously angry towards my ex", what she is doing is unconscionable." I let myself feel the anger intensely, in fact I encouraged it and even multiplied it a bit. I sat with the anger for a few minutes just feeling it, until it passed. Then I went though each of the frustrations or emotional issues I'm facing, one by one, and allowed myself to feel the sensations.

I really did the opposite of what I would normally have done - try to force myself into a positive frame of mind or a thriving mindset though affirmations or thinking positive thoughts

I then realised that suffering is part of our human experience. We can we try to force ourselves to thrive. It feels like really hard work though, and actually doesn't work. It's a form of supression and denial. Also point out a thriving person who hasn't suffered through heartache, pain and loss. We don't thrive 24/7, and we shouldn't. We should be having negative and difficult emotions - its healthy. The trick is not allowing ourselves to wallow for lengthy periods of time, by using this 5 minutes trick (I really set a timer on my phone ) and then when the thriving feelings come, like love, awe, curiosity, peace, happiness, joy, we can lengthen them by affirming them and building momentum.

Suffering is a part of our human experience. I discovered today that the quickest route to thriving when I'm not, is actually to feel the 'bad' stuff deliberately and as intensely as I can. It's almost like it clears the stage and the thriving thoughts just naturally entered the empty stage. I didn't force them, they just came into the vacuum.

This afternoon, they came again whilst I was driving in traffic. I focussed again, giving them full airtime. They were over after a few minutes and I could get excited about the meeting that I was going to.

I hear of Tony Robbins doing this in 90 seconds. For me it took 25 minutes. I call it "time to baseline". The other day, it took  4 hours   I think this is progress, not perfection.

[Moselle]

I had a really anxious start today, and I needed to do this again. It took me 45 minutes this time , but it really freed me up emotionally with lots of energy to do what I needed to do to move forward thrivingly. Again, I did not need to force the positive emotions. They just filled the void, once I had given all the suffering stuff airtime, and allowed it to move on.

BI, what methods do you use to process emotions, I'm also quite new to it?

[Sadly]

I write poetry Moselle, good, bad or indifferent, sometimes I can't see through the tears to write but gradually words flow out and it calms me enough to let me pick up and carry on. Xx

[bestintentions]

Moselle, thank you so much for all of that!  I guess when I said I was "always looking for new methods", I wish I'd have said "I need A method"

I think I've always thought that suffering through something was, innately, the best way to learn.  This has worked well for solving life's problems at work, home, etc., but the pain from this discard was/is more than I ever cared to know.  I've never been through anything like it.  Therefore, I've been suppressing the thoughts and feelings about her deliberately (when I can) and it's been much easier with the very LC I've had (hopefully that will continue until the divorce is final).  For that, I'm thankful.  After reading many stories here about having the opposite happen, I'm taking the small victories as they come.

I'm not saying this is for everyone, but I believe an antidepressant has helped me significantly.  It has really helped with ruminations and pointless conversations I've had with myself.  I'm 46 with absolutely no history of depression so I never thought I'd be on one.  But when you're feeling the deep, deep pain from the withdrawal and longing to hold someone... .you'll do damn near anything to relieve it.  It was so bad I just wanted to be numb to everything.  Thankfully, lexapro hasn't made me numb and I even think it's allowed me to step outside myself in many ways and look at the last 25 years of my behavior more objectively.  Perhaps the anger will be allowed to flow now as time passes, because so far I've felt almost none.

I also have followed a neuroscientist named Sam Harris for many years.  He practices mindfulness meditation and has a couple of podcasts that walk you through it.  Boy, does that take patience, practice and commitment.  I've found it extremely difficult to do when in the middle of high anxiety or sadness.  Perhaps your new "experiment" will be more helpful during these times. 

Thanks again for sharing!

bi