Achieving Emotional Freedom – 12 Tips to help you

We all go through emotional ups and downs, it’s just part of life and part of being human, on the whole though emotions shouldn’t be too much of a roller coaster.

Sometimes however, a negative emotion can creep in like an uninvited guest that we are just too polite to kick out.  At first you might tolerate its presence, but the negative impact of such a destructive emotion can become intolerable.  Negative emotions can be a heavy burden to bear; indeed the weight of the sadness that they can bring or the corrosiveness of the anger or jealousy they can conjure up can be all consuming.

Negative emotions can take over your life, squeezing out all positive thoughts and meaning that everything happy and positive is met by a negative thought or insecurity. For example, if a boyfriend proposes to you and you have been hoping for the moment that he would ask you to marry him; then you may initially be happy, excited, ecstatic, but then in no time the negativity creeps in and you start thinking, ‘he’s just asked me because he feels sorry for me’, or ‘because he couldn’t find anyone else who would wash his socks as well as I do’’, or ‘because that girl he dated eighteen years ago moved to another country, if he hadn’t he would have asked her’’. Many of the negative thoughts you have, you may recognize as being destructive, unfounded and not even really valid fears or insecurities, but still you find yourself on a destructive negative downward spiral that will not allow you to escape. You can’t stop the flow of negative mind chatter and end up carried away on a sea of negative emotions.

If you have ever felt like this, as if you are controlled by your emotions and that you are literally walking around shrouded in anger, shame, jealousy or sadness and that you cannot escape, then you need to stop the negative emotional cycle and gain emotional freedom.

If you are tired of acting as if you are happy, carefree and life is just a walk in the park, amidst the heaviness that you are carrying around then the good news is that there are options, but the bad news is that there isn’t a magical quick fix, but the first steps are:

1. It’s time to let go of negative emotions, but there will be a reason that the emotions have surfaced- it is often as a result of an unresolved emotional issue that needs dealing with, so that we can move on.  It is important to realise that emotions are rooted in the body not the head, so talking therapies alone are not going to resolve the surfacing of  these negative emotions. To understand this concept a great starting point is to read ‘Molecules of Emotion’ by Dr Candace Pert.
2. Feelings have a physical cause – Robert Scaer, in 8 Keys to Brain-Body Balance explains that “feelings” have a physical cause and that physical sensations and emotional thoughts are inseparable. If you have been subjected to past negative events, your sensations might keep signaling your nervous system to stay in protective mode by preparing to be in fight-flight-freeze mode. It takes any sensory signal, such as sound, sight, smell, taste, or touch—but also inner conditions such as stress can act as triggers and place you into an alarmed ‘survival mode’.
3. Sometimes emotions don’t tell us the truth. This is a really important lesson to learn and a big step in the start of emotional detox. When we are stuck in an emotion mire or triggered emotionally, it is easy to get overwhelmed and for our emotions to take over, but our feelings might not tell us the whole truth. For example,when you are trapped in sadness and loneliness after the irretrievable break down of a relationship and  you tell yourself negative stories, such as ‘’Nobody will ever love me again.’’, or ‘’it’s because I wasn’t good enough to be loved’’ or ‘’ I’ll be alone for the rest of my life.’’, ‘’I’ll never find anyone who could bring themselves to love me’’. These beliefs are just negative and untrue, they don’t serve you, and they just prolong your feelings of sadness and grief.
4. Don’t run from the emotional discomfort.  You really cannot escape and hide from your emotions. Masking them with indulgence, alcohol, drugs, shopping, new friends, new pets, the latest gadgets or new hobbies will not act as a long term solution. Only through a full emotional detox can the emotion be allowed, accepted and dispatched, allowing you to get on with a life free from the burden of negative emotions and thought patterns. The self help guide ‘’Emotional Detox through Bodywork’ by Mal Weeraratne provides some great insights into how negative emotions get stuck and how they can be released.
5. Don’t get caught up in your emotions – observe them as if you are an outsider. This may sound a little strange but it is easier to stop yourself feeding yourself with untrue negative stories if you take a step back from your emotions and observe them as if you are someone else. Practice observing the emotion without engaging with it and you will learn so much about yourself.
6. Keep a Journal. For those thoughts and feelings that just wash over you to the point where you feel you are drowning, it is sometime useful to just write it all down. Don’t worry about spelling, grammar, punctuation or even getting it to make sense, just write and get the thoughts and the tears flow.  It doesn’t matter if you burn your entry at a later point, it is a really good way of expressing and ordering your thoughts.
7. Meditation. There are so many benefits to meditation. It is scientifically proven to improve health, boost the immune system, aid sleep, still the mind,  alleviate mind chatter, alleviate anxiety and depression and calm the nervous system helping to relieve stress and bring about emotional balance.
8. Yoga. There are many different styles of yoga from gentle, restorative yoga, and the more challenging types such as hot yoga, ashtanga, kundalini and vinyasa flow amongst others.
9. Compensate for your stress in your diet. Too much diary, processed foods, eggs and meats are not the only causes of excessive acidity. Indeed physical and mental stresses also produce acid residues which must be balanced to sustain good health. A good diet is only going to support your emotional and physical health, so try to adopt an alkaline diet, there is a great chapter in Mal Weeraratne’s book on this.
10. Spend time in nature. Nature has such restorative properties and if it is only for ten minutes a day, make a pledge to spend time in nature each day. Our modern, fast paced lifestyle means that many of us work in offices and spend very little if any time outdoors each day, just sitting in nature to eat your lunch can be really relaxing and help clear your head.
11. Deep Breathing. Breathing exercises release tension, reduce pain, and strengthen the nervous system; they are quick and easy to learn and immensely beneficial.
12. Healing. Whilst you can emotionally detox yourself, it can take years and you may need additional help in clearing heavy energies and obstinate negative emotions from your system and restoring equilibrium.  Deep bodywork such as that performed at Tantric Journey has enormous benefits and works very effectively. An experienced healer will be able to identify where energies are stuck, clear the blockage and infuse your energy field with healing, positive frequencies, helping you to gain emotional freedom and begin to lead a more peaceful, balanced, happy  and blissful life.

If you would like to book a session with Mal Weeraratne then please click here or alternatively if you would like to know more about the Tantric Journey courses for couples, click here.