Five Steps to Begin Processing Painful Emotions
These steps are designed to support you in identifying and processing painful and challenging emotions that can cause ongoing disruption and upset.
They can be very helpful to use as you feel a build-up of emotion from an event (otherwise known as a ‘trigger’), or as an ongoing practice to strengthen your awareness.
Adapt them to your needs. They may feel a bit strange to begin with as you will already have an internal ‘map’ of your nervous system. The map will start to rewrite as you integrate new and healthier ways of being with your emotional world.
Go slowly, notice your distractions, irritations, boredom, and energy surges, and let them all be there. They are all signals that shifts are happening, the distractions can also be used and given full attention.
Allow compassion, care, and gratitude to guide you in this practice. Showing up in this, giving yourself this time for healing is one of the best gifts you can give to yourself. Let love guide you, know love is always loving you, especially when you feel far away from your loving nature.
When your mind is ruminating and critical or fearful, be kind to yourself. Know that below this story is a natural blueprint of health for you to return to. Your unique blueprint of health, the one you were born with. It sits beneath all the trauma imprints that block you from aligning with your needs.
This simple practice can be where you begin to claim back your unique self.
Breathe
Keep it simple. In through the nose, out through the mouth. Longer breath on the exhale. Making a heavy sigh on the exhale also helps to down-regulate the nervous system, which it will love you for. Your breath is your inner lover, it makes space for you to process, heal, and regenerate. It gives you space for rest and digestion. It is your life force. Receive the breath with loving gratitude. Be aware of your breath and return to it through this exercise. Use it to pause and to help with whatever comes up for you.Resource/Orientation
Be sure to be in a comfortable space where you won’t be disturbed. Make sure you feel orientated, safe, and neutral in this space. Make it a familiar space that feels supportive. Take time to make contact with the space you are in, feel your feet on the floor, or feel the support underneath you if you are lying down. Let this fully resonate until you feel ready to explore further. Fully take in all the objects in the room and your surroundings, even if this is a familiar place.
Bring in an added resource (consider a time, a place, real or imaginary) where you feel grounded, safe, and at ease. You can also go to the esoteric and call in a guide or a being to be with you in this practice. This gives you a healthy stable environment to bring in anything that may feel challenging or dysregulated.
Spend time in this resource to feel fully engaged with it.Identify what you are feeling
Invite in present emotions or sensations, without judgment or any pressure to change them in any way. You are simply coming into a closer relationship with them. I know they may feel painful yet they cannot harm. Consider them as small children who want your attention, they want you to respond with care and compassion. You can do this by just giving time to each emotion as it arises. If it feels ok to do so, put a hand on your heart and say to yourself ‘I am here’.
Say the emotion out loud. You may not be able to give it an exact name. It may feel numb, nothing, fuzzy. Use words that make sense to you. You may also feel more clearly, anxiety, rage, fear, perhaps joy, love, and vitality. Allow all that is there to be felt.
If you feel your system is moving too fast, your heart racing for example, you can bring attention to a part of your body that feels still and grounded. You can step fully out of it at any time by moving, shaking your arms and hands, and making a noise of VU (sounds like VOOO).
Go back to orientation to the room you are in. Look out the window, and see the sky, the ground, all that is familiar.
Take a moment to just pause. You can transition to something less intense or go back to the activated emotion feeling more resourced again.
These feelings make a lot of sense, it's been a long time with so much unfinished business.Listen to your body
Check in with your body, get below the story of the mind and the emotion, and notice what is happening at a body level. Check-in with temperature, speed, and constriction (usually in the throat, heart, and jaw), there may also be colours or images and sensations.
Not feeling anything is fine too. If you feel stuck, numb, and disconnected, this is just fine. This is what you are feeling. Be with feeling no sensation. Trust your body to communicate at the level what feels doable. The wisdom of your body knows exactly what to do, so if it wants to keep you numb for now, then allow this support.
Notice how your mind may be getting involved and telling you how you should be feeling or what you should be doing. Allow yourself to drop down from the mind to the body. Think less and feel more. This is the heart of a somatic practice.Completion
Bring your practice to an end in any way that feels right to you. Use some big outbreaths with sound. Your nervous system loves breath, sound, and movement. You may want to get them all going on. Jump, dance, walk, just move your body with any sound you like and some big over-the-top breathing. Hug yourself, and ask for a hug. Play music, get outside, lie on the ground. Listen to what you need. If there are tears, welcome them, let them go. Big dirty cries are so welcome!
Brief Overview
The overall intention for this practice is for you to stay present with your experience. To allow feeling and the experiences of your body to come into the present, free of the cognitive restriction of your mind with all the old patterns and stories.
Breathe – Use your breath to down-regulate your nervous system so you can move feelings and sensations, your breath creates space and energy for you to do this.
Resource/Orientate – This brings in safety and grounds you to your present reality. It creates a welcoming spacious supportive environment for you to bring in more activation and challenging imprints that need completion.
Connect to feeling – Bring in the emotion/emotions that are activated. Allow space to feel them without judgment or trying to change them. Just notice them and become familiar with how they feel when you don’t turn away. Gently move towards them for as long as you can hold.
Connect to your body – Scan for all sensations and movements of your body as it responds to the emotion, notice how they work together, and notice how your body tells you it feels safe or unsafe. How it is experiencing sensation and emotion. Let your body communicate directly with you via a variety of sensations.
Completion – Bring your practice to an end in any way that feels right to you, go at the pace your nervous system needs. Sleep, dance, and ease back into your day. Honour your being.