When I teach mindfulness of emotions,
I invite people to look not at the “narrative” but how it actually feels in our bodies. I have learnt that feelings can be examined best by looking into the body.
For happiness I would look at what part of the body do we feel happiness? What color does it look like to us? Is it expansive or a constructive feeling? The more nuanced and subtle we can learn to be, the more exact we are at understanding how we really feel.
After practicing this for some time I am more attuned to feeling happy, I notice it more because I am more aware of the “feeling” or “embodiment” of it. I feel it all the time, in moments with my children, family, friends, and in nature.
As with other feelings I have found happiness to be fleeting. It’s felt in a moment and then can change to another feeling.
Mindfulness has taught me to know that feelings, unless I ruminate on them, pass through me, a little like clouds in the sky. Knowing that I am not my feelings and that feelings pass has been freeing to me.
It’s one of the reasons why I think mindfulness is a wonderful tool for helping us be more emotionally regulated. It helps us to acknowledge our feelings whatever they are in the present moment but without getting caught up in them.
#Mindfulness has taught me to know that feelings, unless I ruminate on them, pass through me, a little like clouds in the sky. Knowing that I am not my feelings & that feelings pass has been freeing to me. Click To Tweet
Miranda Thomson is a mindfulness coach whose work can be found on her Facebook page.
