• Emotions Without a Story

One of my focuses in recent days has been to really *really* observe my emotions without a story. Different circumstances evoke different emotions - but once I feel something, I focus on the feeling, name it, and take the story away.

For example, when the house is a mess, often times I look at it and feel, "failure - you are a bad girl for not cleaning up the house and doing your chores. You get a D- for housework. No going out with friends until this pigsty is cleaned up."

I can attach a whole long story to this - going back to childhood; school (any surprise I was a straight-A honor roll student?); etc. Instead, I'm washing the story away and I'm naming the emotions:

Guilt.
Shame.
Inadequacy.

In one single word, I'd call it: Bad. I feel bad.

Lucky for me, I'm aware enough to know that this is not the end of my journey. Feeling these emotions is just the beginning.

Next, it's time to accept and love the feelings that are there. With no story attached, they are lonely little emotions that have no reason to be there. They don't have a leg to stand on. It makes it that much easier now to love them, let them be, and them let them GO. Consciously, I make a tweak in my thinking - I close my eyes and visualize myself in my favorite place - in the mountains, on a hike, at the summit in the summer - and the best feelings come pouring into me.

I focus on this new, higher vibration. Breathe, breathe, breathe the emotions in.

Open my eyes. I'm still in my kitchen. There are still objects lying around the countertop, in the sink, on the table, on the floor. But my vibration is still out there on the mountaintop where the best of my self resides and is always available.

I have shifted my emotions; I have raised my vibration.

~  ~  ~  ~  ~