By Jenny Peterson
A lot of things get blamed for causing symptoms. “Negative” emotions are often one of them. You’ll hear of people releasing emotions with all different kinds of techniques to try and heal.
The truth is, emotions have a place and are a part of our human experience. Yes, they play a role in your symptoms but not in the way that most people think they do.
In this post, I talk about what’s really at the root of emotions and why focusing on getting rid of these emotions will only take you so far in your healing.
So, I’m going to start with a pretend scenario.
Brandon and Sharon both go to work one day and are told that they are fired. Brandon is furious and angry that this has happened. He feels like a failure, is mad that his boss would do this and he can’t let it go. It's on his mind all the time. Sharon is shocked at the news, but immediately sees it as an opportunity to grow and create change in her life. She has accepted what has happened and doesn’t let it bother her, she’s optimistic.
What’s the difference between these 2 examples and what determines the emotion for each of them?
It's the perception, right?
In Brandon’s case, his brain is sending a message to his body that he’s not good enough. Because not feeling good enough feels like a threat, rather than a message of safety, its a risk to survival -according to his survival brain. So, his body starts to adapt by having cell loss. His body does this so that when he resolves the situation, the area can become stronger. Stronger, in the eyes of survival, is better.
In Sharon's case, she was able to adapt to the situation fairly easily and because of this, her body never felt like it was getting a message that it wasn’t safe, therefore it didn’t need to adapt.
BAD EMOTIONS
Now we are never told that “good” emotions get stored in the body or cause symptoms, only “bad” ones. So here are a couple questions for you:
Where did the “bad” emotion of anger start in Brandon’s body?
Did the emotion of anger travel from his brain to somewhere else in his body to get stored?
Or did his body respond to the messages of threat that the brain was sending based on his perception?
Let’s go through these one by one.
The emotion of anger started in the emotional part of his brain based on his perception that he was a failure and that his boss would do this.
The emotion of anger didn’t travel anywhere to his body and get stored. We don’t have storage locations for emotions in our body.
His body responded and adapted for survival based on the message of threat that was sent that was caused by his perception.
The emotion of anger in this example is not the root cause for Brandon’s body adapting. His perception was. Anger was the result, or the bi-product for how he perceived the situation.
From Brandon’s experience, nothing got stored in his body. The only thing that got stored was the memory of this situation in his subconscious, that includes his perception, beliefs and emotions. The brain wants to store this memory for future use and reference if needed because it was a threat.
“Bad” emotions such as fear, anger, frustration, shame, hate, etc. get a bad rap and are often blamed for symptoms in our body.
Trusty Google says that the jaw stores anger and hatred. Pain in the lower back indicates suppressed anger and frustration, and your intestines store fear. Here is the deal guys, emotions don’t take up physical space in our body. If we stored emotions, some of us would be carrying suitcases with us for overflow. This is just not how we are biologically designed.
Years of trauma and emotions are held in one place in our subconscious. It's when we let go of the perceptions based on these traumas, that our emotions will dissolve and our symptoms will go away.
So when we are told that our tight/sore hips are from years of trauma and built up emotions, this really isn’t true. First of all, we can’t ignore the physical needs of our body. Tight hips could be from simply sitting too much, it could be from past injuries that caused our body to compensate and the tissues have twisted, years of bad posture, poor circulation to the area, etc. Our tissues will adapt to try to stay in balance and that in itself can cause muscle pain and stiffness.
From a biological perspective, when muscles hurt, it means that we are in a healing phase. While you experience a situation where you perceive or feel like you are not good enough, the tissues break down. When you resolve that, they start to rebuild. That is what is happening when there is pain and inflammation. Just like when you work out, you actually tear your muscles and the pain you feel the next day is the repair process to make you stronger.
When pain becomes chronic, this means that there are some unresolved patterns that need to be addressed that are keeping the body from completing the healing process.
We also hold our body in a tense state when we are stressed. Over years this can become so automatic that we don’t even notice it. The pain that a person may feel in their body is due to adaption in the body, not from emotions being stored.
ASSOCIATIONS
Your subconscious is programmed by association. In fact, we learned everything we know because of associations. It's how our brain is wired and our patterns are created. Emotions are a part of that association, but they are not the root cause.
The body doesn’t store emotions, but it does create associations. Your body helps you survive with these very associations. When you experience pain or emotions from a movement, it is because you are having an associated event.
We only know something is hot because we learned that the feeling of that hot cup is different from the cold cup. We learn that hot is dangerous, and to stay away.
Your body tenses when it's in a stress response. This becomes a learned reaction in your body, not because it's stored in the body, but because it's actually wired into your brain by association.
My left shoulder used to get tight and would almost touch my ear when I would get stressed. This wasn’t because there was an emotion there. Its because my body was wired to tense up in this location when I felt that way. Getting rid of that response required me to work on my subconscious stress patterns and teach that area of my body that it was ok to relax. I had to break that association.
Danger is learned. Our body responds out of protection. It adapts.
We wired our brain with these associations and then we also trained our bodies to clench, tighten and react. We need to stop blaming our body for all of this, its doing what its designed to do. It starts in the subconscious.
WHERE EMOTIONS COME FROM
Just where do our emotions come from?
Our brain is wired to look for threats or rewards. If one is detected, the feeling region of the brain alerts us through the release of chemical messages. When our brain detects a potential threat, our brain releases the stress hormones adrenaline and cortisol, which prepares for a fight or flight response.
When we detect or experience something rewarding, such as someone doing something nice for you, our brain releases dopamine, oxytocin, or serotonin. These are the chemicals that make us feel good and motivate us to continue on the task or behavior.
Sometimes the reactions of the feeling brain are so strong that it dominates our behaviors and we're unable to think rationally in the moment, our emotions hijack our brain. While many of our emotional responses happen subconsciously, our thinking can influence our emotions and sometimes this can be unhelpful. Just thinking about something threatening can trigger an emotional response, depending on what your perception is. This is where we can manage our emotions with conscious thinking.
Underneath every emotion, there is a perception that caused that emotion. You can't have an emotion without a perception first. And underneath that perception, is going to be your core beliefs that are driving it all! It's a big domino effect.
Core beliefs cause your perceptions, your perceptions cause you to have certain thoughts and emotions, those then cause us to behave a certain way. This is why emotions are a bi-product of our perceptions and not the true root cause to why our body adapts and creates symptoms.
A DEEPER MESSAGE
Our emotions and symptoms are a deeper message.
All emotions are part of being a human. Its important to take away the labels of what are bad and good and see them for what they are. Emotions that bring us down, or cause us to behave in harmful ways, are simply messages that there is something deeper going on. If we continue to let those emotions drive the bus, they will influence our life and health.
It's like that kid at school that keeps getting kicked out due to bad behavior, it's not that he's necessarily a bad kid, it's most likely that he has some stressors in his life that are contributing to that behavior.
The real role that emotions play is helping you see where you need to shift. If you feel angry, what is at the root of that anger? How can you take action to shift it, see it a different way or do something about it? What is this emotion telling me that I need to hear and grow from?
PERCEPTION
Perception is a powerful force that shapes our understanding of the world and influences our emotions and actions. Our perception acts as a filter through which we interpret events, situations, and people. However, when our perception is distorted from old ways of survival, it can lead to wrong emotions and misguided actions.
For example, if we perceive a harmless comment as an insult, we might feel anger or resentment towards the person who made the comment. These wrong emotions can cloud our judgment, hinder effective communication, and strain relationships. They can also lead to unnecessary conflicts and emotional distress for ourselves and those around us.
Remember, that unless you really have done the deep work, you are most likely perceiving the world through old perceptions that you created as a child. Adults are literally walking around in adult bodies, but responding to life from a childlike perspective.
These old perceptions are the root to your symptoms, emotions, triggers and really all problem areas of your life. Recognizing and addressing old perceptions is essential for personal and professional growth. Here are a few strategies to help mitigate the impact of distorted perceptions:
Cultivate self-awareness: Reflect on your own biases, assumptions, and preconceived notions. Understand how they influence your perception and challenge them when necessary.
Seek diverse perspectives: Engage in open and honest conversations with others. Listen to their viewpoints and consider alternative interpretations of events and situations.
Practice empathy: Put yourself in the shoes of others to better understand their perspectives. This can help uncover and correct misconceptions that may be influencing your emotions and actions.
Activate your pause button: Whenever you feel triggered by someone, something, or some situation, "hitting pause" and take a moment to breathe and ground yourself into the present moment so you can choose how you will respond from a more empowered place.
If a few deep breaths aren’t enough to help you shift, don’t be afraid to give yourself a grown-up time out.
Changing your perceptions requires that you, first and foremost, take responsibility for your past unconscious reactions. It’s only then that you can begin to see people, events, things, and even yourself from a more neutral or positive perspective.
WHAT DO YOU DO WITH YOUR EMOTIONS?
This work isn’t about shoving emotions under the rug or ignoring them. Give yourself permission to experience it, but not at the cost of others. Once you’ve sat with it for awhile, dig into where this emotion comes from. What perception led you to feel this way? Where does that perception come from? What do these emotions remind you of from when you were younger? Journal these out on paper; because what is on paper will reveal deeper connections.
There is no point in sitting in emotions that bring you down. Don’t play a victim to them. Use them as a stepping stone to uncover a deeper layer.
Realize that no one can make you feel anything. Your emotions are your own. Take responsibility for them and the perceptions that led you to them.
Becoming aware of your emotions helps you understand the perception-thought-emotion connection. This can help you weaken and release the hold of strong emotions. In addition, it helps you build the awareness muscle that is required to heal and step into your 2.0 self.
SYMPTOMS ARE BIOLOGICAL
A lot of people misunderstand this work and think that its emotional work, but it's not. It's biological. Because your symptoms are a biological response (a response wired into our bodies for survival) to a perception of not feeling safe. The perception is the root cause, not the emotion.
Every time you feel angry or frustrated, it's not going to cause a symptom in your body. Thank goodness that is not the case. This is what happens when people start doing mind-body work. They are not only in fear of eating certain foods from the programming from other protocols, they are now also afraid to feel a “negative” emotion because they have been told those are bad too.
We need to stop with all these restrictions and rules and keep things simple. Your body is adapting, based on your perception, which creates symptoms. Its the perceptions where we don’t feel safe or feel a threat to our survival that are causing your symptoms.
If you’re trying to get rid of emotions to heal, please know that this is only going to take you so far. It goes much deeper than this. When you step into a 2.0 version of yourself where you can shift perceptions easily and respond to life with ease, you won’t be experiencing those emotions that you want to get rid of. Instead, you will feel more joy, peace and happiness in your life.
Jenny Peterson is the founder and CEO of Mind Body Rewire (MBR). She teaches those that are overwhelmed with trying to heal chronic symptoms how to simplify their healing by focusing on just one place, the subconscious mind. Learn more about MBR here.
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