Bumps on the side of the road

Have you ever thought you were an emotional wreck? What in the world does that mean?


What does it mean when someone says “I am an emotional wreck?” Or, why do some people believe women are more “emotional’ than men? Why do we judge not only our own emotions, but other people’s emotions? Why would I get to weigh in on whether or not your tears are authentic and whether or not you are showing “too much or too little emotion?” What would it really mean if someone said you seemed incapable of showing emotion or that you don’t show enough emotion? Can I get control of my emotions? Are they even ‘my” emotions?

As I reflect, I realize we need to see if we can pinpoint what exactly an emotion is made of….hmm. I can’t see my emotions. I can’t put them in a box. I don’t ever seem to have control over them. I don’t choose them. I haven’t mastered inviting them in and I certainly have never ever, ever mastered getting rid of them. They appear uninvited and typically their timing stinks. Emotions come and go, they sometimes seem to change from one minute to the next. Hmm. This doesn’t necessarily indicate something we should be using to guide our lives.

In therapy world there is a model called Health Realization. The essence of this understanding is recognizing mind, consciousness and thought in action. Mind being something bigger than ourselves, consciousness is what brings our reality to life and thought, everyone who is on their mat knows what thought is (think that voice in your head that tells you to push, back off, stay on the couch when you shouldn’t, stay on the mat when you should be on the couch, eat the 3rd piece of cake, etc.).

In this model, there is much focus on becoming aware of how thoughts come before emotions or feelings. Another way of saying this is that there is never a feeling without a thought coming beforehand, even if we aren’t aware of it. In addition, there is this component of recognizing that our thoughts come and go; that we don’t have control over them; that we don’t decide which one’s come in to our minds. This has been true in my experience. I don’t decide to have a string of neurotic thoughts arrive. I don’t decide to have “catty” thoughts about other people and I don’t decide to have self-defeating thoughts. They just arrive.

Now, I do realize this goes against everything we have all learned from Jack Handy on Saturday Night Live. Remember his skit? He is sitting in front of the mirror repeating to himself “I am good enough, strong enough, something enough..” He believed he could change his thoughts so that he could feel good about himself. In my experience, I can’t change my thoughts. I can try like hell, but I can’t change them. I also can’t change my feelings. Seriously, I have tried and it hasn’t worked, at least not for me. In my experience the more I try to change thoughts and feelings the stickier they become. Thoughts and feelings do change, but it’s not me changing them.

So, anyway, if our thoughts come before our feelings and we can’t control our thoughts and I can’t control my feelings, then why do I give them such importance? Why do I ever believe them? Why, why, why? Why do we have to give them meaning? Couldn’t thoughts and feelings just be thoughts and feelings? Couldn’t they just be present, part of our make-up? Couldn’t we just see them for what they are? What are they? Aren’t they concentrated forms of energy, getting more and more momentum the more we focus on them? Getting to be gargantuan when we resist them? Resist and they will persist. Focus on them, talk about them, stew about them and they grow like a brand new chia pet.

I had this teacher in my Health Realization training whose name was Keith. He is an amazing person. He is kind, gentle, funny, big and Texan. One time he talked about how useful feelings/emotions can be in our lives. He said they can be like the bumps on the side of the road that let you know you are headed into the ditch. When you are driving and you hear the tires hit the little bumps do you get out and see what they are made of, or how many there are? The bumps are like our emotions, they can give us a head’s up that we are caught up in our thinking mind, that we our following the never-ending winding road of our mind. We don’t need to know the gory details of them, we don’t need to analyze them, we just need to know that they are thoughts. I don’t know about you, but that never-ending winding road typically leads me into messy waters.

Okay, but what about people who don’t seem to know there are bumps on the side of the road, I mean people who don’t seem to have, show or know that they have any emotions. Sometimes we talk about people like this by saying “they really aren’t in touch with their emotions” or we say they seem to be “numb.” We all know people who numb themselves in some way. In my profession we call that “self-medicating.” Are they numb? Are they really without emotions? Hmm.

If you were driving your car and you had your radio turned up, you were on the phone, your kid was screaming and you were thinking about your over due visa bill is it possible you wouldn’t notice that you had run over a few of those bumpy signals on the side of the road? Is it possible that we have had an experience or experiences that we have resisted certain feelings and emotions so intensely that we have started driving while straddling the line of bumps? We might have become mistaken and believe that if we straddle the line we will be happier or that if we straddle the line the mad mind will stop spinning said thoughts and emotions. If we drive straddling the bumps we don’t really have to allow ourselves to experience/feel the messy, uninvited emotions. We can keep on this route. We can play it safe. Not really living the moments and not in the ditch. What we resist will persist and we will have to keep straddling the bumps. If we could just feel the messiness and see it for what it is we can get back to the center. Our center.

Early on in my yoga teacher training, I heard a yoga teacher talk about how emotional she became after she moved into a regular practice of backbends. Honestly, I thought she was completely full of it (that would be an example of Ami’s thinking). Right. So, as I began teaching and began to incorporate heart opening poses and backbends I had more and more students begin to talk to me about what was occurring for them during and after these practices. Then, I attended a training where the teacher had us do a zillion back bends. You guessed it. Later that week waterfall city. Stuff I thought I was over, was not so much over. A symbolic heart-ache following heart openers. Hmmm.

We do know the body is made up of energy. Right? Everything is made up of energy. In the yogic tradition we think of the energy in eight different centers of the body. These centers are called Chakras, or spinning wheels of energy. Each energy center is associated with a specific region in the physical body. So, if we did backbend after backbend after backbend, it would seem to open up the energy center around our heart, which would seem to bring more emotions to the surface? Hmm. Makes sense to me.

In addition to practicing backbends and other heart opener asanas, I think we all have our own ways of not straddling the bumps on the side of the road. These are other ways of opening up our hearts and experiencing the messy and oh so exquisite emotions we are capable of having as humans. For me backbends will do it, so will plugging in to my ipod and listening to some Bob Marley or listening to Yo Yo Ma play the cello suites. Heart opening also happens for me during writing, taking pictures, rubbing Vince’s feet while sitting on the couch, giving a thai massage, feeling the Mexico heat in July, hiking in the redwoods, riding on the train and looking at the gray landscape of an Illinois winter. For you it may be walking in the cold air with the sun on your face, it might be drawing, it might be working in the garden, teaching kindergarten, or watching your kids play in the park. It really doesn’t matter what it is. They are all just tools and opportunities to recognize what we are and what we aren’t.

I suppose what matters is that we know that we have thoughts and we don’t have to do anything about them. I suppose what matters is that we know we have emotions and we don’t have to understand them, do anything about them or get control of them. I suppose what matters is that we don’t resist, that we know we will be okay if we experience extreme emotions and crazy thoughts. I suppose what matters is that we know there are moments we have the opportunity to soak up being alive and to be open to the exquisite emotions we are capable of experiencing. I suppose what matters is that we remember we aren’t our thoughts or our emotions and to live fully, we don’t need to straddle the line on the side of the road.

No kidding, I couldn’t make this up (well, I probably could, but I am not making it up).. As I finished this essay, my ipod began playing Hearts Wide Open by Jon Smith. Check him out. The song is on his Traveler Cd. If you have an opportunity to ever see him in concert, he might just make your heart melt.