Dealing With Emotional Baggage

We’re all guilty of it. It appears in numerous forms. We carry them about with us, store them in the darkest recesses of our minds and souls. We have a large collection of recollections of them. It’s not uncommon for people to shed tears at the least provocation when they think about their loved ones. Others may be enraged, harbor profound animosity, and engage in anti-social or confrontational behavior as a result of this.

Many people are haunted by shadows, whether in their dreams or in the midst of the day. Anger out of control, which has the potential to escalate into violence, can strike at any time.

Others will remain in a state of denial, completely cut off from the rest of the world. It’s always someone else’s fault if something goes wrong for certain people; they blame everyone but themselves. What about the victims and the perpetrators of abuse?

Many people get disoriented while trying to locate something they cannot place. There’s something wrong. In schools, workplaces, and churches, a horde of lonesome faces line the streets, sit in public areas, and agonize throughout the day. It’s a constant reminder that we’re all in this together. Road rage is uncontrollable because our roadways are open channels for people to vent their grievances. Scary shit!

Excessive emotional baggage may be costly. When the weight of this responsibility becomes too heavy to carry, some people succumb to it. They see no need to continue the war. They find the world harsh and pointless, and life loses its luster. If there was ever a fight, it’s over for them.

There are many people who live their lives like a piece of driftwood, allowing the river to carry them wherever it will. Is it possible that our reality is so cruel?

What is the source of this emotional pain?

Broken dreams, failed relationships, lost hopes, betrayals, violations, childhood trauma or other types of trauma, contribute to the health concerns. Many of society and the family’s most vulnerable individuals are scarred emotionally by social humiliation and financial calamities, as well as poverty and addiction.

Is our fast-paced society to blame for this? To all of this, we may now add the quest for monetary gain, an unending supply of trinkets and devices, and the rapid advancement of technology. Emotional baggage from broken relationships, diminishing familial ties, and unrealistic expectations of oneself and others is piled on. Some people bear them for a long period.

Even if our bodily requirements are met, we may still find happiness if we take time to listen to our innermost desires. In most areas, there’s an overwhelming amount of resources available, including information, organizations, specialists, and more. Society and people who suffer from deep emotional pain can no longer overlook this crucial issue. 

There has been a revival or revision of wisdom from many civilizations and beliefs in order to fit in with today’s society. If you’re looking for a comprehensive approach, you’ll find it here.

Medical and technological advances are astounding, but just swallowing a pill isn’t always the best course of action.

Determine how much emotional baggage you carry around with you.

There’s a Secret to Getting Yourself to Meditate

By Kevin Schoeninger

As a meditation teacher, I’ve heard countless students share their excuses for why they didn’t meditate in the past week. They wanted to. They know it would be good for them. They just didn’t do it. At least, not consistently.

Something always seems to get in the way: they need more sleep, the dog needs to be walked, the kids are up, they had to work late or had an early meeting, they felt too anxious, worried, or irritable… Meditation just didn’t seem as important as other things they had to do. Yet, all those things they did didn’t give them the peace of mind they desired.

Of course, meditation is about changing your relationship with all the events, worries, and anxieties in your life. It’s a daily ritual-like eating, sleeping, and brushing your teeth-that creates a more relaxed, healthy, meaningful, and intentional way of living. It’s a powerful practice to realize the deep peace of mind we all desire. So, what’s the secret to moving from excuses to practice?

The answer is: you’ve got to have a strong “Why?”

Where do you find your Why?

The answer may surprise you.

The Secret is Body Awareness

Your body is not just a mechanical vehicle for carrying out all the activities in your life. It is a highly-sensitive bio-feedback system.

Your body can tell you what is good for you to eat and how much, when you need to rest, when you need to relax and have fun, when you need to get up and move, and when you need to be alone, have contact with others, be in nature, and spend time in meditation. It connects you to when, why, and how much to do anything. If you’re paying attention.

In our context, it connects you to WHY you might want to meditate in the first place. At least it has the potential to do this-if you pay attention. Yet, how often do you pause and really pay attention to your body’s signals? How often do you stop to sense what it is telling you?

Why aren’t you doing this?

First off, we have a culture that encourages just the opposite. We are encouraged to focus outwardly rather than inwardly. We are encouraged to do as much as possible. We are encouraged to gather as many products and as much wealth, data, and sensory input from the external environment as we possibly can.

We are encouraged to react quickly and are discouraged from taking time for well-considered and deeply felt responses. We are conditioned to quick reactions and sound bites on news and social media. We are impatient with anything that takes time. We go, go, go, until we are too exhausted to continue.

Do you feel this exhaustion?

Yet, are you worried about what might happen if you stop? Are you worried you’ll fall behind and be left out? At a certain point, you may decide you just don’t want to live this way anymore. When you reach this point-or preferably long before that-take a moment to pay attention inside. Notice what all this thinking, doing, worry, accumulation, and stimulation is doing to you.

Is there another option?

Meditation Creates a New Way of Being

Meditation interrupts nonstop thinking and doing and gives your body a chance to relax deeply-something you may not even get to do in a restless sleep. Consciously relaxing, as you do in meditation, unwinds tension accumulated beneath your awareness in the past 24 hours as well as in the years of your life up to this point. It slowly dissolves the reactive mental-emotional patterns that drive you on the hamster wheel of nonstop activity. It quiets your mental chatter.

Now, when you first start to meditate, you may not notice this relaxing, quieting, and calming effect. You may become even more aware of how busy your mind is, how conflicting your emotions are, and how tense your body is. If you have mistreated your body through over-stress for a long period of time, initial moments of Body Awareness in meditation might not feel so great.

Or, you may feel little to nothing at all. All that thinking, doing, and pushing yourself to do things you feel you “have to” or “should” do may have cut you off from how you feel. You may have lost touch with your vital sensations and feelings. You may just feel bored without external stimulation keeping you distracted.

Yet, discomfort, boredom, or numbness, when you face them honestly, directly, gently, and without judgment, as you do in meditation, can alert you to just how much you need to activate another way of being.

If you heed this signal and take time to sit, breathe, and mindfully notice what’s happening inside-the layers of stress will begin to unwind and your vital senses will reawaken. As you unwind, Body Awareness may tell you just how exhausted you are from the way you are going about your life.

As you pay close attention to what your body has to say, you might find that all those things you’ve been chasing after may not be as important as they seemed. You may discover you don’t want to live on the human hamster wheel of incessant activity, worry, and anxiety any longer. You may be inspired to make new choices that reflect your soul’s deeper desires.

Meditation beckons you to a more relaxed, healthy, meaningful, and intentional way of living-and your body will tell you just how important this is-if you pay attention.

Kevin Schoeninger is a writer and teacher of Mind-Body training, including Mindfulness, Meditation, Qigong, and Reiki. He is the author of the book “Clear Quiet Mind” and numerous guided meditations and programs in the field of personal empowerment and spiritual growth.

The Power of Breathing

“When you breathe, you inspire.  When you do not breathe, you expire.” – Quote from an 11-year-old’s science exam

John Grinder, co-creator of NLP talks about the link between respiration, physiology, internal state and high performance.  He calls this ‘the chain of excellence’.

First; when you are experiencing a powerful, positive state, allow yourself to become aware of your breathing rate.  Pay particular attention to the timing and rhythm of your in-breath and out-breath.

Second; Next time you are in a neutral or negative state, start breathing at the rate and rhythm from exercise one, and within a minute or so, the positive state should begin to return.

Many of the ancient text advise people to do breathing exercises regularly. Tony Robbins in his book “Unlimited Power”, advises that you start each day with a breathing exercise of inhaling slowly and deeply, then holding it for twice as long as the inhalation and exhaling in twice the pace. It really is invigorating and a great way to get motivated at the start of the day, especially if you are looking to do some things with your day that require motivation.

Breathing is powerful! It’s essential to our life force, and is a major influencer on our state of mind.

So, finally; Start breathing comfortably but deeply, in through your nose & out through your mouth. Imagine that you are breathing from that area of your abdomen just beneath your belly button. Make the in-breath last to a count of 5 and the out-breath to a count of 6.  Continue for at least 2 minutes, and notice what happens.

These techniques can be very powerfully utilized when wanting to get in control of your state if you are going through a period of change such as reducing your weight, stopping smoking or developing more confidence.

Please remember that most people don’t breathe nearly enough.  Start to breathe more deeply and notice how much better you feel.  Have lots of fun with this. Notice how good you can make yourself feel when you breathe differently.

Who Am I? – A Meditation Of Self Identity

Who am I? What comes up for you when you ask this question of yourself? In terms of memories, ideas, how you’ve been described? What do you identify with? Does this process of identification help you, or just cause suffering? Are you still figuring or learning about who you are?

Perhaps when your favorite basketball team loses, you suffer as though YOU lost. When your car is damaged it feels like YOU got hurt. When someone attacks who they think you are, does it seem as though they’re actually reaching inside and poking at your true nature (they’ve struck a nerve)? How can you escape the unnecessary drama and pain? (more…)