The alchemy of emotions

Emotions. You can express them, get rid of them, communicate them, block them, sweep them under the rug, suppress them, etc. You think you have a choice, whereas you do not.

An emotion is a big or small wave of energy. It doesn’t matter if we classify it as a positive or negative one. It is just energy for movement, action or expression; it is useful to stay alive. Thanks to it, we can verbalize our feeling of love, jealousy, anger and our needs. If emotions are not shown, they become trapped in the body as a tension, which feels like a clamp, discomfort, pain, causing a lack of flow or even a physical trauma that becomes a disease.

Nowadays we have more and more good tools to work with emotions, to feel them, express them and heal them. The most popular are Alexander Lowen's techniques, Bert Hellinger's settings, voice dialogue and breath work.

While working with emotions, not only can you release them, which brings temporary though vital relief, but you can also transform them into something more beneficial for your body and mind. For, as we all know, not all emotions can be expressed at a given moment, even if we are aware of them and want to break through our door of personal or cultural censorship.

What’s more, we do not have direct access to all feelings because they are trapped in the past or in defence mechanisms we create for our own safety. However, apart from the techniques mentioned above, there is one more option: meditation. One of many tools of meditation is developing a sense of your body, and raw body sensations flowing in it. The more you develop mind sensitivity to what is happening in your body, the more sensitive you become to the emotions that arise from sensations and thoughts. Thus, you can catch the moment of their formation, gradation and dissolution. If you give enough time and space to this process through mere observation and presence, without analysis, judgment, story-making, or story-telling, then they will assimilate with the rest of your being. The previously blocked, and therefore useless or even harmful energy, is now being integrated and energizing you and your life. From this moment, it serves and supports you, and this is what I call alchemy.

language consultation Anna Czyżewska