Embrace UR Dark Side 2 too!
June 15th, 2010I’m feeling a little fucked off this morning. Yes, fucked off, I said it. And it’s my blog so I can!
I’m really feeling bugged by this ‘all positive all the time’ obsession we seem to have developed. As usual we’ve got part of the information and run with it rather than understanding the whole story.
So the Law of attraction has swept the world and it’s becoming main stream awareness that we create our own reality through that which we focus on. Cool, so the very simple version is this, think positive thoughts, lead a positive life.
Well Yes, and No.
The truth as my extensive study and experience has me understand it is this, everything is Energy. Us included. Our bodies are a very cool and clever energy system, directed by our consciousness. Don’t worry, I have a point you’ll care about.
It is that emotions, the way we feel IN OUR BODIES is the way we experience life energy as it flows, trickles or even stagnates in our experience.
While I totally believe that our natural state is wellness, joy, peace, love and essentially connected bliss. I feel like too many of us are trying to short cut the path to this place of wholeness.
We think if we just focus hard enough, try long enough, if we’re committed and diligent enough and choose only Positive thoughts and speak only positive words then sooner or later we’ll arrive at the all positive all the time feeling state. Maybe?
My feelings on the matter are this…..
We didn’t come here for all positive all the time, we came here for Life. When we look around at nature there are cycles always. Cycles of becoming, creation, new life and cycles of falling away. True peace and lasting happiness I believe comes from being able to be in the moment and accept what is. What is does not always feel positive.
Granted when we get all Zen and think with out Universal mind we can connect to the knowing that nothing is ever really lost and everything is always perfect.
Most us though are not yet living Zen. Most of us are living a delusion where we think if we just don’t think about or speak about the bad feeling stuff it will cease to exist.
Ha! What I’m learning is this; the bad feeling stuff is energy. It hangs around in our body and in our experience until we are ready and willing to feel it. It needs to be felt to be processed.
And even tho we avoid feeling the bad stuff like the plague, the truth is that there is power in the bad feeling stuff. There is energy tied up there. And as we become willing to face and feel that stuff, as we allow it to process and pass through so we clear the channel within us to be ever more open to the life giving flow of the fullness that is Now.
What is this bad feeling stuff? Where did it come from? And why is it here? Well it’s come from our experience so far. From the life we’ve lived (and maybe even past lives?). It’s all the stuff that when it happened it felt too much, too intense, to painful or scary to deal with so we shut it down. We pushed it out of our awareness. We might have tricked our self into thinking it was gone for good. After all we weren’t THINKING about it. But no, it has always been here within in us, in our energy body.
And the only way to truly get to happy and free is to clear out the crud of the past. Simply using our will power to endeavour to be positive even when we’re not feeling it is never going to work. And if we’re successful at not dealing with any of the crud all we’re doing is setting our self up for major pain at some point.
The crappy energy within when stored and added to without being felt and released becomes, dark moods from hell, deep depression, major illness, self sabotage of all forms. All sorts of nasties come from not owning all of what’s really true for us – what’s really going on within.
So bad feelings are important too! They have a place. They are not to be squashed and ignored and denied. They are to be examined and owned and felt for they hold amazing wisdom for us and creative seeds. When we discover what we don’t want we can become ever more clear on what it is we do. When we discover who we are not (which always feels bad) then we can know with more certainty who we really are.
Journal writing is a powerful tool for processing our emotions. A safe space to examine and feel our dark or bad feeling energies and to get to the bottom of what they have to share. You can write for release, write to create and write to enjoy. That is get life’s energy flowing freely through you, which comes when you dare to honestly feel the way that you do! Embrace your dark side too.
Much Love, Soli xxxx
as always, thought provoking and insightful. I am starting to agree with you
My understand is this: It is ok to feel however you are feeling. You are where you are, don’t resist your state or it will persist. Also, don’t cover it over with happy thoughts or they will erupt later at an inconvenient time. So what is left? Simply to release it. How?
1) Journaling is an excellent way. Write it down. Then read it back and notice that is (or was) how you feel (or felt). For me this creates a distance or space around the feelings and can also shift them into the past. Feel the emotions as strongly as you can. Now ask what is different and notice any shifts? Are they less intense? If not do something else and try again later or try a different technique.
2) Try to find the fear or part of you that has these feelings. Ask which perspective or point of view gives rise to these emotions. Extend love to that part or to your entire being. Note that I said extend love, not love that part. Extending love is the feeling you have for a puppy when you stretch out your arms and invite it to come and play with you, or the feeling you get when you see a new baby so cute and innocent. Try to feel the emotions as strongly as you can while you extend love. This is hard as the emotions tend to fade away as you extend love. You can use this technique to shine light on not only the current emotions, but bottled emotions from the past as well.
I’m sure there are many more ways, but the trick is to face the emotion as opposed to run away or suppress it. Ask what can I lean from this experience. The divine may give us a cruddy day when we forget appreciate the good ones. Don’t get lost in blame of yourself, the person who caused it, or the divine. Finally for me, I must remember to tune in, not tune out.
Right on, Soli!!! Thanks for saying what I’ve been thinking for quite a while now. Admittedly, I used to be one of the “light chasers” myself until my energy got so constipated that nothing was working. I was denying my dark side and it’s just as you say – a vast storehouse of energy locked up in unexpressed emotions that were not MOVING. Thank goodness I finally realized what you are saying. My journal has been a constant companion throughout my journey. Love your site, thanks for sharing your wisdom! Lisa (fellow PT grad)
Soli, I totally agree with you. We go through the things we do in life even when at the time we don’t understand why for a reason, its personal growth, without growth we would stagnate. I do believe in the power of positive thinking but as all things, it has its place, moderation and needs to be coupled with other aspects as well.
It takes courage to face our past, deal with those emotions and purge ourselves, Gold has to go through the fire to be purified, and an egg has to be cracked before you can make a delicious omelet.
Please have a peek at my blog, http://melanie-wadham.blogspot.com/
Hi Soli, I do have the tendency to run away from things that don’t feel good, but less now than before after committing to a meditation and deepened spiritual program. I’m learning to say ‘hello’ to those dark places and work on befriending them. Thanks for sharing your light in the world. Leslie (another fellow PT grad)
Great point, Soli. We humans, and particularly we development junkies, have this tendency to want to only look at the positive side of anything in life, when it is also beneficial to have a hard look at the ugly. This is something I’ve begun to do in the past week as well: to be willing to look at the crud when it happens so that I get the learnings from it as fast as I can. This way I’m starting to transform the way I approach the “bad” stuff, since I’ve begun to see it as a fun process despite its discomfort. It can only lead to a higher rung on the ladder.
Something I’ve also noticed lately is that my body gives off certain orders to turn away from certain tasks, and my mind has unconsciously been taking those orders instead of keeping my intention as boss. Now that I see this, it’s much easier to identify when it happens and to feel the discomfort that leads to procrastination or distraction. This is a way I’m using the “bad” stuff to get to the goodies. So “good and “bad” is only a description that we assign anything, and so we can reassign as well.
By doing this intentionally over & over, the discomfort gets smaller and less influential, and one’s opinion of discomfort begins to change to a more positive one, to one that permits it to exist and to tell us more efficiently what it is we need to learn from it.
Thanks for the post!
Soli,
I happened upon your website after doing my journal therapy. I have been using journaling to heal, exactly as you described.
You explained the energy so very well! Some of the positive thinkers do NOT touch on or expalin dealing with the negative energies and it becomes confusing! I have spent 20 years dealing with the crud but not effectively! Im only learning now, and getting into what Spirit has been telling me for a long time, “WRITE”.
Thanks for your honesty and thoughts!
Blessings,
Christina