Honoring your ‘Bad Feelings’?

How often does it happen to you? Right after you come home from work, the first thing you pick up is your TV remote or turn your Netflix Series? You could be ‘Doing’ anything, checking out all the feeds and stories from your folks or people you follow, basically anything that keeps your mind occupied. Do you wonder why you cannot sit with yourself for a second without doing anything? Even you may be lying down on your bed but lost in Thinking; your body does not get rest.

There is a phrase in Italian, ‘Dolce Far Niente,’ which means the sweetness of doing nothing. It’s a beautiful act of self-love when you allow yourself to BE and realize what it is like to exist just as a Being. Although I am trying to glorify this art of doing nothing for a moment, it could be terrifying and painful for many people to sit with themselves—precisely the reason why the primal instinct of pain avoidance kicks in.

The practice of sitting and allowing yourself to experience fully all the feelings, especially those you label as bad (shame, guilt, fear, insecurity, jealousy, envy, sadness, anger, and disgust), is one whole different approach of emotional healing from conventional meditative practice. Imagine yourself as a parent with several naughty children (‘bad feelings’ as children). Will you ever punish your child by abandoning them crying continuously? No, but that is what most of us do with our feelings.

Or will you try to listen to the child and understand what they need so that they stop misbehaving? Would you not honor the need of your child if they are crying for chocolate? Do you see my point? All these feelings are part of our humane experience. Therefore, they must be part of your experience for some valid reasons. All of these feelings have some message for us, and they would be pacified immediately the moment listen to them completely.

An excellent example, if I ever feel envy, my immediate reaction is always how bad a person I am. I should be happy about the other person’s accomplishments. That’s alright on the surface, morally.  Then, I dive a little deeper to realize what this feeling of envy is trying to tell me. ‘I need that very thing too. It feels great to achieve something.’ This self-talk occurs when I allow myself to experience envy completely. Then, I would feel inspired to achieve that thing instead of beating myself up for envy.

One crucial feeling I want to emphasize is ‘sadness.’ The very impulse not to feel sad makes you sadder because you stopped it right at its emergence. My journey of healing speeded up exponentially the moment I allowed myself to

experience all the grief wholeheartedly. Especially for men, we are taught to suck it up, harden ourselves, to project an image of strength. Such suppression is eating you from inside like a termite. Being vulnerable and connected to your emotions makes you a stronger man. In addition, you will have access to a treasure of resources that would enrich you in any role as a son, husband, father, or friend.

I do not endorse being sad by any means but would definitely encourage stop vilifying sadness. You will find the key to Letting things Go there.

Assuming I have succeeded in convincing you that you too want to honor all your feelings right now. You are wondering how you would experience all your feelings at once. Am I going to tell you to meditate again? Haha, not this time. The bottom line would be to guide through doing to thinking to being.

It could be one of the many ways that resonate with you most. For me, journaling works best; my right hand becomes my mind, the words start flowing on the paper.

I literally put down each detailed thought without any analysis or logical interpretation. Just let everything come out from your head, exactly as they are. There is no fear of judgment, criticism, or suggestions, only honesty. Your brain becomes too slow by the end of your venting; you will have the best sleep you have had in ages.

Suppose you are good at self-talk and brave enough to listen and reciprocate those conversations objectively and honestly. You will experience the same magical lightheadedness, and of course, that good night’s sleep. Finally, if you are fortunate to have a few friends in your life who are deep enough to listen to you non-judgmentally, you will master the art of BEING yourself just by experiencing all those feelings that have been bothering you for years. I hope this blog resonated with some of you. Let me know if you have any comments, questions, or suggestions about this post.

By the way, that Italian phrase ‘Dolce Far Niente,’ I learned from my favorite movie, Eat, Pray and Love. Do watch it.