How are You Feeling Today - A Stress Reduction Technique

How are you feeling today?

• anxious
• lonely
• depressed

Experiencing your emotions - or working through them - keeps your stress levels from rising... and the fight/flight response from activating.

Experiencing your emotions is a key to physical, emotional, and intellectual health! So... How are you feeling today?

Sometimes people use drugs, alcohol, or emotional eating to deal with or numb their feelings. While this may seem to help the feelings go away, they just get suppressed and the food, alcohol, or drugs stresses the body.

Learning how to effectively work with and through your emotions can help decrease the need for other substances.

If you're unfamiliar with the world of emotions or what to do with them - you're not alone! The information on this web page is new to most of my private clients and the participants in my workshops.

I am on a quest to educate adults about the importance of feeling their feelings.

So... what is a feeling?

A feeling is a body sensation that you experience when energy is moving through you in certain ways. When you're having a feeling your body produces particular types of molecules - the molecules of emotions.

Our feelings are usually triggered by our thoughts...

Though sometimes situations remind us of a memory that has a strong feeling associated with it...

...And other times circumstances such as a life threatening situation create a instantaneous emotional reaction.

If you aren't used to experiencing your body's sensations, it is helpful to practice mindful movement regularly. If you do so, you will begin to notice the different sensations you are experiencing throughout your day.

In general, "good" feelings have a sense of opening and flow in your body and "bad" feelings have a sense of closing and tightening... Sounds like stress to me!

Emotions provide information about your experiences and your thoughts. They can help you understand your reaction to what's happening in your life and what you're thinking about for the future.

They can help you navigate towards a life of purpose, joy, and ease.

So... How are you feeling today?

Feelings are biologically hardwired into our bodies. There are "Molecules of Emotion," which you can read about in Candace Pert's book. She has studied the body-mind-emotion connection and written books on the subject for lay people.

Use the following eight general categories of feelings to help you answer the question... How are you feeling today?

Click this link for a description of the sensations associated with each of these feelings.

• Joy - tells you that what you're doing - and thinking - is in alignment with your Purpose and what you REALLY want.
• Love - lets you know that you really care about someone or something.
• Excitement - tells you that what you're thinking about the future is something that you really want.
• Anger - lets you know that you have perceived an injustice or that you want to right a wrong.
• Fear- lets you know that you're experiencing a threat to your safety - physical or emotional safety.
• Shame - is related to guilt. Guilt feelings let you know that you believe that you've done something that is wrong or bad and shame happens when you feel like your whole self is bad.
• Sadness - lets you know that you have experienced a loss of something that really matters to you.
• Surprise - happens when something startles you or something you weren't expecting happens.

Still wondering how are you feeling today...

Feelings don't always show up so clearly. They come in combinations and there are many different words to describe them.

For more information about how to identify your feelings, click here.

I used to feel overwhelmed by my emotions - like I had no control over them.

And as far as I can tell, it's true, we don't have control over our emotions. But we do have control over the thoughts that help create them and what we do with our feelings once we're aware of them.

If you STUFF your feelings and don't let yourself experience them, they will continue to affect you with things like high blood pressure, high cholesterol, depression, anxiety, addictions, or challenging relationship issues.

Emotions and Feelings - What to do with Them?

I recommend asking yourself everyday - how are you feeling today?

Experience your feelings and understand why you're having the feeling (though this is not always necessary) and...

Take the actions that your feelings are asking for, and then let them go.