A woman called today sharing how the words DISASTER RELIEF (Tennessee Tornado) unexpectedly dropped her into tears about her wanting relief from her disasters. She was SHOCKED this emerged in her thoughts. Weeping she said, “I don’t like when feelings immobilize me, and I am heading out the door. Well, I don’t like them anytime.”
The gift of UNEXPECTED feelings is an invitation to enter feelings that lay DORMANT. The curse so to speak is how one can beam too far out with all the WHAT IF’S that these feelings surface.
Sometimes past losses rise up, and sometimes images like the tornado in Tennessee can open you to, as she said, your own disasters within or around you. Disaster is a strong word and she discovered it was a calling for feeling and seeing she is human, despite her priding herself in being able to problem solve. The MIND wants answers always. The HEART is a rhythm within that won’t betray you.
Her personal story is private. Her sharing of unexpected feelings is common in all of us. From my working with thousands of people for decades across the world, I am GRATEFUL that people are willing to feel and that they ask for help to access more feelings that includes their fear of the never ending tears, their fear of, “I don’t want to feel that AGAIN,” their thoughts of, “I am all ALONE with my self-feelings, I can’t trust people because I have been so betrayed, I just want ANSWERS to why-why-why.” The shares are long and familiar, as each of us, honestly, has times we suffer. We just feel SHAME around sharing because we have a thought that says, “I should do better by now. I should be OVER this.” When we hear ourselves TALK about our fears, this vulnerability is precious, and also a gift to you in bravely saying what is surfacing.
Today, I INVITE you to write, talk, sketch, walk in a quiet place, light candles, play music, etc. Whatever helps you to know YOU better and care for yourself. What helps is to remind yourself to breath (deep in and deep out), pause, notice what you see right in FRONT of you in order to be present with yourself and ground to present moment. Do this over and over. It takes PRACTICE. It doesn’t mean you have to say it all or write it all at one time. You know you and you know where you want to go.
BEGIN. Be gentle.
Take care,
Natalie
“You are finding your rhythm over and over. What worked for you one day may not work the next and that is “normal.”
Natalie Caine, M.A. natalie@lifeintransition.org
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