your emotional wellbeing
Emotional wellbeing is about managing how you feel; recognising and appropriately expressing emotions, rather than suppressing them or being overwhelmed by them.
Having feelings is a normal and healthy part of being human. Whether you label those feelings 'good' or 'bad', they are messages, telling us how we are doing in life, what is important to us and are also useful for intuitive, 'gut' reactions to people or situations.
Emotions cause problems when they are not acknowledged or are suppressed. The British 'stiff-upper lip' can negatively impact our physical and mental health. Learning to understand and recognise how we feel, giving safe and appropriate expression to our emotions, enables us to feel better.
In the field of energy psychology, this acknowledgement and expression is said to enable the energy of these emotions to 'flow'. The result being that energy blocks - which create ill-health - are avoided, and the feeling naturally subsides.
Having feelings is a normal and healthy part of being human. Whether you label those feelings 'good' or 'bad', they are messages, telling us how we are doing in life, what is important to us and are also useful for intuitive, 'gut' reactions to people or situations.
Emotions cause problems when they are not acknowledged or are suppressed. The British 'stiff-upper lip' can negatively impact our physical and mental health. Learning to understand and recognise how we feel, giving safe and appropriate expression to our emotions, enables us to feel better.
In the field of energy psychology, this acknowledgement and expression is said to enable the energy of these emotions to 'flow'. The result being that energy blocks - which create ill-health - are avoided, and the feeling naturally subsides.
adult emotional wellbeing
- To understand your emotions better, keep a daily journal recording how you feel each day. After a few weeks you might see a pattern, or how certain situations or events affect your feelings. It's a process of getting to know and understand yourself. It might feel uncomfortable or unnatural at first - but persevere! Seek help if you feel you need it.
- Once you start to acknowledge your feelings, focus on accepting how you feel - even if these are 'bad' feelings. Rejecting them, or yourself for feeling them, can make them worse because 'what you resist persists'! In energy psychology, resisting emotions actually gives them energy; 'fuelling' them so they become stronger. Accepting how you feel takes the 'heat' or energy out of them, softening their grip on you.
- Express your feelings by talking to someone neutral who will remain objective. Or write a letter detailing how you feel then shred or burn it. You might find it easier to draw your emotions, pummel plasticine or write a song. As long as it is 'getting it out' without harming yourself or anyone else.
children's wellbeing
- Even young children can learn about their feelings and how to deal with them - with a little help from you. Show your child how to manage their feelings by managing yours appropriately.
- Children can easily feel overwhelmed by their emotions but if you can stay calm they will soon realise that feelings are not something to be afraid of, and this will lessen the impact that their feelings have on them.
- Stories are a good way of explaining to children about anger, sadness or anxiety offering strategies to help them cope and overcome how they feel. 'Emotional literacy' is a term that describes this ability to manage feelings and children who learn how to become emotionally literate are more likely to be more resilient, experiencing emotional and mental wellbeing.
Copyright Sandy Hartley 2023. All rights reserved.