If you are a human being who has had a fair share of life experience, chances are you’ve already been through a rich range of emotions. From joy and utter happiness to sadness and frustration, we have access to feeling this wide palette of emotions. Many of us, due to previous experiences combined with the fear of not being able to handle some of them start disregarding their emotions, thus numbing themselves.
Meditation has a powerful impact on the way we interact with our emotions. Firstly, at the beginning, during the meditation sessions, old emotions long ago put under the seal might start to awake. Some beginner meditators fear that these previous emotions might take the best of them, might become so present and real that they will feel they are experiencing them again. So, they try to resist, to push them back.
From experience, meditation helps clear the negative emotions associated with an uncomfortable past situation in a clean and neat way. The mind acknowledges them as being there, offers them the space to breathe and then lets go of them. Imagine that you are in a small, dusty room where light is barely coming in. You have to breathe in this compound that has not been aired for decades. Do you think that it will be comfortable? No. A mind haunted by previous negative emotions that have not been dealt with, is a mind that will not allow you to live a happy, peaceful life, in clarity and acceptance for what is real in this very moment.
During the first meditation sessions, as the mind starts releasing the “baggage”, the body will also support this clearing and cleaning process. So, tears might come down your cheeks and people who have experienced this say that there is no feeling of sadness associated to it. It is just a letting go of what has been inside your mind and heart for a long time. Of course, depending on your individual experiences, strength of mind and determination to let go of the past or keep dragging it into your future, the process of freeing yourself of past emotions through meditation can be more or less smooth. But bear in mind, there where is light, it is an opportunity of seeing and there where is space, it is a possibility of knowing.
Secondly, meditation will help you get in touch with your emotions. Sometimes, inside 30 minutes we can experience so many states of mind. During meditation, we learn to acknowledge the feelings that we are having. The mere fact that we can name impatience or bliss or inner peace is a huge step in understanding who we are in certain situations of our lives. Another distinction that meditation creates is this: “being with the emotion” and “becoming that emotion”. We can call on anger when we feel it without becoming furious and acting from that place of anger. So many times we say or do things that are not really reflecting what we actually feel. Sometimes we attack people because we feel vulnerable or hurt. We all know what they say “attack is the best defence”. It actually isn’t. Not when you start getting in touch with your own emotions. When you start befriending both your mind and your body, they will be invaluable assets to understanding how you feel about things. It also goes in the direction of embracing our positive emotions and being able to share them. It is amazing to hear people congratulating each other or people empowering others. I wish I could hear more often “I believe in you! You will make it happen!” when someone shares with us their life dreams or upcoming projects.
Lastly, meditation shows us how to let go of emotions. A thing that really works is realising what you feel and breathing it out. It goes something like this: “I am really angry now! I choose to breathe out and act from a place of clarity.”
Hope this gives you an insight into how meditation can help you get in touch with your emotions and lead the way to a fulfilled and authentic life. We’d be happy to hear from you: how did meditation help you relate to your emotions?