Wednesday, June 22, 2011

6/23/11—Feeling and Healing

Today's Draw: Eight of Swords from the Law of Attraction Tarot. What's the difference between healthy emotion and unhealthy emotion? Do you think you work through issues "correctly"? What do you think you could do better in the realm of emotion?

Here we see someone caught up in their emotions, possibly overindulging their emotions to the point of depression or numbness. And there's the rub. Sometimes it's hard to tell where the line is drawn between a healthy course of emotion and wallowing in self pity. The same flow of feelings that can lead to our salvation, can also lead to paralyzation.

There are two tapes from my childhood that damaged my ability to feel (parents take note). One was my father saying "don't cry, because you look so ugly when you cry." And the other was my mother saying "stop feeling sorry for yourself". Now I don't think they were trying to harm me with those words, but they did. Because as I grew up, for many many years, it was very hard for me to cry. I could cry if there was someone to cry to, but I couldn't just sit in my room and sob. And I remember how truly satisfying a good cry was as a child. You know, like those cries that leave you feeling weak and spent. And I longed to "get it all out". But every time I would start, in my mind I would hear either my mother or father stomp on my tear-filled buzz. It's still hard for me to manage to cry about anything. 
When I think about how I respond to sad things, I usually err on the under-emotional side. I sometimes wonder if I ever really learned to respond appropriately to very emotional things. On one hand, I'm usually pretty balanced about things (outside of the random menopausal mood swing). On the other hand, sometimes imbalance is called for, don't you think? It's just so hard for us to know if we're navigating this aspect of being human "correctly" and in a healthy manner.

Anyway, the woman in this card is wallowing. She feels inside the way it looks outside. And unlike all the other people on the street, she walks without an umbrella. Without protection against the falling skies around her. We always hear that you've got to work through your feelings. And I believe in that. But again, when have we over-worked our feelings? I don't know if there's an answer for that. 

I do know that, if you're someone who isolates themselves when they're feeling low, like me, you eventually have to force yourself out into society. You have to connect with others again. And when you get sick and tired of feeling sick and tired, you have to buck up and move back into the world with an open mind, a fresh attitude and the willingness to try again.

So what do you think about all this? When was the last time you had a really good cry? And how do you know you've "felt" enough?

4 comments:

  1. I think you've felt enough when the feeling dissipates. If the feeling is still there, you haven't felt enough. Once you fully connect to the feeling it moves on quickly (within seconds). There is one caveat though: if you continue to think the thoughts that brought on the feeling in the first place, the feeling will return.

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  2. OK. I'm hearing you. But, like, you know I've become obsessed with things in the past and I think and think and think them through and through, keeping the feeling alive. And now I don't do that so much anymore. So is it that I used to need that? Or was I overindulging myself then? Because I think it's the latter.

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  3. You were overindulging your mind. Doing meditation and your spiritual work has probably calmed down the monkey mind.

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