Hello!

 

Last week I shared with you part one of this three part series about how to communicate your emotions without causing an argument. I shared with you how you could become a better communicator of your emotions by increasing your emotional vocabulary, and understanding that sometimes when we think we're expressing our emotions, we're actually projecting, which usually causes tension between you and your listener. I also gave you the chance to down load my free emotions list poster to put up in the house or at work so that the people around you can become better communicators too.  If you missed it you can get the emotions list poster here

 

This week, I'm going to teach you about understanding your emotions so that you can better express them. You see, the problem is that we don't value feelings in the west so we don’t invest in really learning to understand them. And when we communicate them, we don't really know what we're trying to communicate, or why we're trying to communicate it.

We don't even really know how we feel

Ever had a dispute with someone and, as you thought about what happened, you get more confused and more worked up? And the story just goes round and round in your head like a stuck record. And no matter how much it goes round in your head you’re either no clearer on how you feel about it, or you’re just angrier cos you’ve got yourself all worked up?

 

Sometimes trying to work things out in your head

just makes things worse

 

So what I want to share with you today is how to really get a handle on how you're feeling and why you’re feeling it. And to do that we need to do two things.

 

First, we need to locate where in our body we’re feeling it.

Get curious. Do you feel it in your gut?  Or is your heart heavy? Are your shoulders hunched and your back rounded?  Or are your shoulders back and your chest out? Is your breath short and shallow? Do you feel energised in your arms or hands? Do you feel weak at the knees?

This is probably a new experience for many people because we tend not to embody our experiences but instead go straight to our brain to work it out. But our bodies are communicators, they have feeling centres that communicate information to the brain.  These feelings and sensations are there to tell us something of our experience.  Don’t block them out but instead be curious about what your body is trying to tell you.

 

Second write about it.

You see there's a big difference between thinking about something and trying to process it in your head, and writing about it in a journal.

When we think about it, we just go on autopilot loop. We don't come up with anything new or creative. We don't come up with new thoughts or inspirations, instead we just replay the tape over and over again.

But here's the thing. Every time we do that, we make ourselves more righteous or more victim, and we make the other person more wrong. We tweak the story and emphasize little bits so we can feel better about ourselves. It might be self-serving in the moment but in the long run its likely to cause damage to our relationships

 

Rumination sabotages relationships

 

When we write about it, trust me we don’t endlessly write about it over and over again in a loop and get nowhere.  We actually write an account of what happened from our perception.  And through this action we can start to discern what is it, exactly, that triggered us.  What was it that was said that really went to our core?

When we do this we can start to look inwards and use it as a growing edge to understanding ourselves better.  When someone hits a raw nerve in us, we know that this is an area to be explored.  The more we explore these hidden parts of ourselves and uncover what’s been triggered, the less people can trigger us and the more control we have over our lives. 

Do you hear what I’m saying?

We become better at communicating our emotions

We also start to take responsibility for our part in things and, the less we blame other people for our uneasiness.  Sound like more harmony? It might not excuse what someone else has done but without our baggage wrapped up in there, perhaps we can have a more relative response or even have some compassion for the other person.

So, next time you feel triggered, annoyed, anxious or stressed try to notice where in your body you are feeling it, get your journal out at the next available opportunity and start writing.  Right from the very first time you do this, you will find you have more clarity on the situation than if you’d kept going over and over it in your head. The best part of all this? The more you do this the better you will get at understanding how you feel and the better you will get at expressing your emotions. You’ll learn a whole lot about yourself that you never knew and you’ll be less triggered and effected by what others have to say.

I’ve got a attic full of journals!

I’ve been writing journals for nearly twenty years because they’re a really good way of managing overwhelming emotions. And over the years I’ve written pages and pages of stuff that I found challenging at the time. Occasionally if I glance back through them it amazes me how much more emotional intelligence I have now than when I started. I also find now that I get triggered less and know myself really well.

Want to know yourself better and understand your emotions?

Start journaling!

I’ll be sharing lots more about emotions and triggers and journaling and inner work in this blog so check back regularly for handy hints and tips that you can easily incorporate into your life. I also run workshops on journaling so if you feeling stuck or that you could be getting more out of your journal writing, come along to a journaling workshop and learn how to get the most out of your writing.

For today I think there’s quite a lot of information here so I’ll save the last part of this three part series for next week when I’ll be sharing my last tip on how you can communicate your emotions without causing an argument.