Emotions are one of the primary driving forces in our life. Our survival instinct causes us to seek out pleasure and avoid pain. Quite often we miss out on life’s pleasures because the perceived pain associated with gaining the pleasure we seek is stronger than the perceived benefit.

Emotions and feelings are our natural reaction to external life events. We encounter an external event and we have an emotional reaction. Quite frequently we find ourself unable to fully express the emotions we feel. This can occur for many different reasons but fundamentally we have concluded either consciously or subconsciously that the pain associated with expressing the emotions we feel is greater than suppressing the emotions.

Emotions are essentially caused by different energies flowing through our body. They are created by us as a defence mechanism or to allow us to feel the enjoyment inherent in a situation.

When we are unable to fully experience our emotions we are forced to store the associated emotional charge. The law of conservation of energy dictates that this emotional energy, once created, must be processed or stored. It will not simply vanish.

When we are unable to fully experience or express our emotions we usually associate pain with the experience. Our survival instinct causes us to separate from this pain as much as possible. As a result the stored emotions are driven deeper into our subconscious.

The emotional pain, however, continues to linger and causes untold damage as it subtly influences our daily choices and experiences, often without our conscious awareness.

Let us assume we experienced anger which we were unable to fully express. As a result we store some of the anger we felt. The emotional charge will attract people and situations into our life that will cause us to be angry. The intent is to enable us to release the stored anger and free ourself from the pain.

Quite often, however, we are unable to express the second time around what we couldn’t express in the first place. As a result we end up with an increased emotional charge stored within our energetics. The attraction for similar emotional experiences continues to increase and we end up storing more and more suppressed emotions.

This vicious cycle continues until the pattern is broken. If the cycle continues for too long we run the danger of the suppressed emotions surfacing suddenly and possibly violently as our emotional volcano erupts. At this point we are likely to have little conscious control over our emotional expression as our survival instinct takes over to release the incredible build up of emotional pain. These sort of violent emotional eruptions are seen when the mild mannered neighbour suddenly becomes irrationally violent and surprises everyone.

A much better way to deal with our suppressed emotions is to make a conscious decision to take back control of our life. All emotions are valid and need to be acknowledged as such. Emotions are our natural reaction to life. There are no good or bad emotions. There are, however, good and bad ways of expressing our emotions.

During Emotional Awareness Therapy we reconnect with our suppressed emotions. We acknowledge their presence and their validity. Quite often we gain increased understanding of the original causes which introduced the pattern of anger, depression, or whatever the emotion may be into our life.

While accessing these suppressed emotions can be painful we need to understand that the pain caused by carrying these emotional time bombs is much greater. We have traded momentary pain avoidance for life long pain. It is time to pay off the emotional credit card and enjoy emotional wealth.

Our suppressed emotions want to surface and we need to work hard to keep them in. Storing suppressed emotions is just like holding a beach ball under water. It requires constant attention and a lot of energy. As a result we are left feeling tired and lethargic. Suppressed emotions are a major contributor to the ageing process.

By creating a safe environment to experience and express these stored emotions we are able to free up untold amounts of energy that has been tied up in holding them down. The freedom and relief we feel is often incredible and extremely liberating. Most importantly, we can now make conscious decisions to shape our life rather than allowing emotional demons to run our life.

Life will never be the same again once we choose the path of courage and wisdom!