How to Feel My Feelings – What the Therapists Say...

HOW TO FEEL MY FEELINGS – WHAT THE THERAPISTS SAY

This video is a bit different than usual. I reached out to social media to gather advice from therapists on how they help their clients to feel their feelings. I share with you the themes that arose.

With thanks to the following for their ideas:
Kids feel their feelings in their whole bodies, our emotional experience gets smaller as we grow up: Carly Radford
1. Viewing feeling as a practice/check-ins: Javaneh Pirzad, Jem, Trevor Burgess
2. Understand resistance to feeling: Cara Martin, Helena Byrne,
3. Name the feeling: Cheryl-Ann Stewart, Jem, Claire Francis, Natalie Barso
4. Get in touch with bodily sensations: Yasmin Shaheen-Zaffar, Erika Kamlert, Amelie Rachel, JR Jinney
5. Accept feelings: Manaal Mulla, Jess [Counsellor], Tracey Douglas,
Alexithymia: Olatunde Spence.

[brooke]

Most challenging - feeling the emotions even when you are overwhelmed by them and they feel like too much. Letting go of the mental story to have acceptance instead of ruminating like that will change the past. Knowing having the discernment of what you need when you are panicked or have persisting emotions. Finding the privacy or safe space (even when you are out or going about your day) where you can cry, shake, scream or hit something safely. And not feeling guilt or intellectualizing everything

[cathywyman]

Growing up we were not allowed to show feelings, even at my mother's funeral (I was 17) my father said he didn't want to see one tear. I don't remember that day, I was disassociated and numb so not to show emotions. We were all scared of him. He was from the old school that feelings showed you were weak.

[saltymermaid]

The golden ticket would be how to express your truth to people who have done you wrong, beautifully

[sile]

As I discovered your channel, a lot of past trauma is suddenly coming up. I’m dealing with it with compassion and see it as part of my healing process.

[Andy-fykz]

"Feeling feelings as a practice" loving it!!! Thank you Sarah!!! This video is so great!!! It is very helpful everything you said ❤ your channel is an international treasure!!!

[echoiswatching]

oh its 5am here! Did i watch ur videos for 4 hours 😳. "Binge watching" lol, literally my whole life is in a binge zone 😬🤩

[davidmugridge]

You have such a lovely manner as you explain all of this. Such empathic knowledge for our clients. Thank you.

[ritapreston]

Just finished my (about twice weekly) class. It takes me a bit to process. Once again, thanks from the heart for you.

[KimLevanen]

Oh wow!! This video is so enlightening! I needed to hear #5🙌🏼🙌🏼

[carodestkijken]

excellent tips!! so utterly useful, thank you Sarah

[katestephens]

What happens if the pain is ongoing? How do you make space for pain when it’s constant? When you care for a sick loved one…. you’re not curious about your pain, you know exactly why it’s there and what caused it, and yet the sadness continues. 😞

[truthandlove]

Just about everything you articulate is accurate, and at times, it touches upon the essence of the task: how to experience one's emotions. However, you then depart from the core issue and don't really teach how to do that. You mention how children experience feelings in their bodies and refer to therapists who suggest doing something similar. That's on the right track but for simplicity's sake needs to be taken a little further. So, may I please? Feelings have corresponding sensations in the body and it's these sensations that require attention. Let me put it more directly: when experiencing emotions, simply feel and observe the sensations within your body. There's no need to label or identify them. This is because we can't always be certain that, for example, the pulsing in the back of our head is anger, or the butterflies in our stomach are fear. When triggered by some event in the present or by a memory fom the past, emotions/feelings/body sensations arise instantly. Depending on the nature of the trigger, the resulting sensations can be either pleasant or unpleasant, but that does not matter. The concept is to permit oneself to remain with whatever emerges. Attempting to identify and label emotions can divert one's focus, engaging it in a cognitive process. The objective is to stay present with the physical sensations, observing and feeling them arise, shift, and dissipate. Remaining vigilant and observing as they arise, move and eventually diminish is the method to process emotions.

[cosmicserpent]

I would rather make my emotional experience dull and muted than feel the pain. Is there a way to do that?

[TwinFlameDivineLovePath]

A 2 year old doesn’t need any schooling on feeding their feelings. We might wwll learn from them.

[boubou]

Omg we've been groomed by our parents and we're doing it from generation to generation 🥲
I love the wheels of emotion and sensation! Thank you so much. Never heard of those and I seem to never know what I am feeling exactly..