Feeling is Healing

Sit With It

I sit quietly and cry at least
two streams from closed lids
Glad to ignore the alarm on my phone
Glad to sit with it alone

---

Rock of Sadness 

Sometimes I thrash with bitter stroke
in a pool of discontent 
Then, my anger spent 
I dry myself on a rock of sadness 
under a  sky that has no sun 
I do these things and let them claim me
for they and I are one

Gut Wound

A dream dies, mortally wounded by the acceptance of reality
I ask it to go quietly, but it does not -
It is a gut wound

I cry out to God "Why are you? Why do you do this to me?"
but no answer comes

After a time, I alter my question
How do I find it?
In what form comes relief?
Soon comes the answer
In grief
In grief

I want to talk about the value of holding space for our feelings. What does it mean to hold space for a feeling? To hold space for a feeling is to dedicate undivided, unlimited, and unconditional attention for the purpose of fully experiencing the depth and breadth of an emotion.

As as humans, we tend to do this readily with emotions that stimulate the pleasure center  of our brain, but not so much for emotions that arise from wounding experiences.  I am referring to emotions such as sadness, loneliness, anger, shame, and grief  to name a few. 

The value of holding space for an emotion is in the healing power that comes from holding space. In short, feeling is healing. 

I've written three poems on this subject, "Sit With It," "Rock of Sadness," and "Gut Wound."

Let's look at Sit With It first.

I sit quietly and cry at least
two streams from closed lids
Glad to ignore the alarm on my phone
Glad to sit with it alone

This poem was inspired by a time when I learned I was going to experience a loss in the near future. My initial response was to run from feeling my sadness about it. I had been avoiding anything that reminded me of the upcoming loss and kept myself busy enough to distract myself from emotions. This was my standard response to uncomfortable feelings. I thought that if I started crying, I would never stop, that the pain would never end.

For the first time in my life, and I can't explain why, I chose to face the fear of my sadness and feel it all the way through. At that time in my life, I had a bazillion alarms set on my phone to remind me to do things - things I thought were important.

While I was sitting there feeling my sadness, one alarm after another sounded on my phone, but I ignored them. I was holding space for my emotion - without condition, without time limit, and without distraction.

And you know what? The crying did end. The sadness dissipated, and I was able to face the loss without fear.

Let's look at Rock of Sadness.

Sometimes I thrash with bitter stroke
in a pool of discontent
Then, my anger spent,
I dry myself on a rock of sadness
under a sky that has no sun
I do these things and let them claim me
for they and I are one

This poem was inspired by the loss of a dream. Something I wanted to happen with every fiber of my being did not happen. I was both angry and sad about it. I tried to stop feeling angry and sad and just accept the reality of the situation, but I couldn't.

I realized that I wanted to be angry; I wanted to be sad. I wasn't ready to feel better. I needed to honor those feelings by allowing them expression because they are part of me. Honoring my feelings was honoring myself. I gave myself all the time I needed to fully experience and express my feelings - I held space for them.

Now for Gut Wound.

A dream dies, mortally wounded by the acceptance of reality
I ask it to go quietly, but it does not -
It is a gut wound

I cry out to God "Why are you? Why do you do this to me?"
but no answer comes

After a time, I alter my question
How do I find it?
In what form comes relief?
Soon comes the answer
In grief
In grief

This poem was inspired by another dream that I desperately wanted to come true, but didn't and the poem has continued to inspire me through many other "gut wounds."

At the time I wrote the poem, I felt persecuted by God. My life had been one painful experience after another - one unfulfilled longing after another. I felt unworthy of happiness, and that what I longed for was wrong to want.

I gave up on understanding why these experiences kept happening, and looked for relief from the pain. As I describe in the other poems, the healing came from holding space for the feeling I didn't want to feel, in this case, grief.

It worked!

On a side note, I believe I did not get an answer to my question of why God is doing this to me because God was not "doing" anything to me. It's like asking someone why the sky is green. They can't possibly answer that question because the sky isn't green. More on this in a future inspiration.

Back to holding space. If you remember nothing else from this inspiration, remember that feeling is healing.

There is no other way to heal, and no food, drink, drug, or distraction will eliminate the need to feel.

As a coach I hold space for my clients by patiently remaining silent when my client is experiencing a difficult emotion and encouraging them to take all the time they need.

How have you ever held space for your feelings?

What feelings did you honored by holding space?

What happened as a result of holding space for your feelings?

Did you experience healing?

If you have not held space for your feelings, how open are you to trying it now?

If you would like help with holding space, I can help you through coaching.

Write to me! As always, I love to hear your thoughts!

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