The Meaning of Feelings

Have you ever paused to wonder why we have feelings? If you haven't then you're by no means alone. After all, feelings have been with us in one form or another since before the day we were born and most of us simply take them for granted.

It might not come as a surprise to learn that my work as a hypno-psychotherapist has everything to do with feelings. The great majority of people who consult me do so because they are simply not feeling good.

Often those feelings have been there for a very long time, or they may only recently have surfaced. But one thing is sure: they just cannot continue to be ignored.

And that's the thing with feelings - we can only ignore them for so long.

We might attempt to distract ourselves from difficult feelings with food, alcohol, drugs or some form of behaviour meant to divert and calm things down, but sooner or later our attempts to deny and distract bring their own difficulties, their own special pain.

When we feel joy, enthusiasm, inner peace or genuine satisfaction then we know that we are doing well, that we are probably headed for something great.

Difficult feelings such as sadness, anger, guilt, frustration, anxiety, fear, low self-esteem and lack of confidence are powerful messages being sent from our own subconscious mind in order to inform and help us.

They are there to tell us how we are doing. Those difficult feelings tell us that something is wrong, something needs attention.

Instead of attempting to deny or to distract ourselves from feelings that we find uncomfortable, we really need to pay attention to those feelings. Listen to what they are trying to tell us.

They are not there to control you. They are there to inform and guide you so that you can be the very best you that you can be.

Anger, for example, is there to tell us that we are perceiving unfairness - someone has been unfair to us or to someone or something we care about. It has a twin: guilt. Guilt is also about unfairness. It tells us that our perception is that we ourselves have been unfair. Sadness is the feeling that tells us we are perceiving loss. Frustration is there to let us know that what we are doing just isn't working - try something else.

By understanding what our feelings are trying to tell us we become empowered to do something about them. By attempting to deny and distract ourselves from them we empower those uncomfortable feelings, allowing them to snowball and become even more monstrous. The reality is that they will continue to try to get our attention until we finally address them.

If you are having a difficult journey, if life's road is proving hard and rocky then perhaps it's finally time to listen to what your feelings are trying to tell you.

No one was born to feel bad. No one was born to live life in a state of anxiety, fear or worry, anger, guilt or sadness.

Inner peace and the simple joy of being alive really can be yours if you stop denying and attempting to distract yourself from those difficult feelings and finally do something about them.

In our feelings there is great wisdom. Listen to what they are saying and then take action.

Yes, it will take work. But it certainly will be worth the effort.

" If you believe that feeling bad or worrying long enough will change
a past or future event, then you are residing on another planet
with a different reality system. "
William James