Have you ever experienced an upward and downward spiral of emotions in the matter of a few minutes/hours/days? If this is a frequent occurrence, one minute clinging on tightly to upward feelings of joy, before suddenly letting go and plunging downwards into a pit of dread and fear.
Do not worry, we have sadly all been there.
But it does not have to be that way. With a simple change of perception, it is possible to lesser the power emotions have over you.
What Is Energy In Motion?
Let us start at the beginning.
The Latin word for emotion is ’emotere’, which literally means energy in motion.
Believe it or not, emotional energy in itself is neutral. That is to say, it is only once we react to the sensation (expansion/contraction) in our body created by the emotion, that we interpret a desired response (thought),based on like or dislike, and give power to the feeling through attachment and labelling (reaction). In most cases, this results in a vocal outburst, giving even more strength to the ‘reality’ of this emotion.
Without an interpretation, all we are left with is moving energy in the body that resembles expansion (usually associated with good feelings) and contraction (bad feelings).
Given that fact, we need to learn to treat this fluid energy with respect and allow it to move and change as it is designed to do. Like everything else, these sensations are impermanent.
“Emotions are like a wave, constantly rising and falling. They are part of a much bigger ocean worth noticing.”
The mistake lies with labelling an energy in motion as good or bad. If we can recognise that every feeling will pass in time, attaching a reaction is pointless. It is pure and simply wasted energy. Instead, we must stay out of the thoughts and strengthen our observation muscle by staying with the sensations. This constant flow of reliable information (in the form of sensation) is a gateway to who you really are at the deepest level.
Voicing the story of how you feel is powerful, but only to a certain point. Though it is in itself a release, the next level can only be reached when you allow yourself to feel your emotions without justifying or sharing them with others.
By bringing a mindful observation to the sensations, you are basically allowing your body to communicate with your mind. It has something to show you about how you feel at your deepest level, and only when your mind can stop and listen, will it invite the energy to be released. Otherwise you are affectively ignoring that inner voice, that knowing.
You know that old saying “listen to your gut”? It turns out it truly does have a lot of important things to say.
Learn to listen, accept and release the e-motion and an internal sigh of relief will come over your entire body and mind.
Get to a point where you can feel an uncomfortable emotion and sit with it anyway, do not judge yourself, ride the wave and watch it slow down.
But the ego is crafty, it wants to stop every energy in motion in its tracks. Using the monkey mind as its unknowing slave, the ego loves to cling to sensations and use them to help define a sense of self and strengthen this identity we have become so attached to.
This e-motion becomes a thought. This thought is then aligned with good or bad. Suddenly our words, overall mood and actions become defined by this thought reaction to a sensation. Good work, ego.
So you could argue that this is a good thing if the sensation happens to be expanding, releasing feelings of happiness. We are all searching for happiness right?
The problem is, if you allow expansion to instantly affect your mood (via thought and story), you are also going to be affected when contraction once again kicks in. To become enlightened from blind reaction, one must cut ties from old habit patterns created to all energy in motion.
It is important to remember that we are not aiming to ignore and suppress any emotion, but learn how to affectively feel and release them instead.
We want to listen to our gut; tap in to how we really feel about a given situation without allowing our monkey mind to take control and swerve in all manner of directions. Before you know it, you are completely lost and unsure where you started.
This is of course easier said than done, and it takes time.
Yet being aware of sensations is the first step towards increasing your emotional intelligence.
How to Deal with Energy In Motion
Here are a few ways in which to practise the art of energy in motion observation:
Find time in the day to sit and meditate, even just 5 minutes will help. Observe any sensation that arises with pure curiosity and zero judgement. It is the first step to acceptance and over time the pattern of reaction becomes weaker.
Allow a moment of space between a strong emotion and reaction. This is where thought is encouraged as a means of analysing the feeling. Simple deep breaths or taking yourself away from the situation at hand to think through the sensation rather than react can really help in better understanding where it came from.
Label the feeling, but do not attach to it. For instance, if you notice a feeling of guilt, think “this thought/feeling is linked to guilt”, observe and at some point it will pass. By noticing and watching this process play out, attachment is avoided and the energy fails to take control.
Talk out loud to yourself about how you feel. Sometimes this is easier than listening to the voice in your head. See it as self compassion, lending an ear to your body to find out why you feel this way. At the end of the day nobody else truly knows how you are feeling, and so nobody else can truly help you to feel better.
Talk it out and let it go. Once you feel you have properly understood the emotion through observation and analysis, feel free to share your feelings with someone close to you. But do not do so with the intention of receiving an answer. Advice is great, but by sharing your feelings along with an already discovered meaning (done so by yourself), you will naturally release the energy and let it go.
With time you will begin to realise that every emotion, or energy in motion, you experience is generated from within and so therefore can only be dealt with from within. External stimuli can only affect you if you let it. This is, unfortunately, a hard-wired habit pattern we all fall prey to, because it is all we have ever known growing up. We react based on what happens outside of us, and allow it to fully control how we think and feel on the inside.
Be patient, persistant and loving with yourself. It takes time to tame that monkey mind and strength to look within.
Emotions are always going to be there and that is okay. It is how we deal with them that makes all the difference.
"With your mind power, your determination, your instinct, and the experience as well, you can fly very high." - Ayrton Senna
With thanks to Kelly http://blueyedview.com/energy-in-motion/
