The Joy Maker Series: Your emotions are the Barometer of your Soul – so are you listening?

Your emotions are indeed The Barometer of your Soul

 Hello hello and welcome to everyone,

Today I am really excited to present to you the first article with my Dance Life column The Joy Maker! And as you may have guessed, the motivation and aim for this regular column, is to give you all tips and tricks, for how to bring a sustained sense of calm, joy and empowerment into your lives.

With anxiety levels increasing over the past few years, addressing this issue is of paramount importance and I am pleased to say that there are certainly things you can do to “take back control” of your feelings and emotions to establish a sense of well -being and joy.

And the number one tool for your Toolkit of Empowerment is to recognize and understand that your emotions are a Barometer of your Soul. In other words – your emotions tell you exactly who you are and how you are feeling. So instead of running from them – you simply need to acknowledge your feelings -both positive and negative – and realize that they are a built -in mechanism to tell you about yourself.

So, in fact – all of your emotions, through the entire spectrum should be viewed, not as a hindrance, but rather as a help. And if you can change your vision to accept and utilize this paradigm, you may just see a big shift in your sense of joy ,and the calm and control  you can exercise in your life. All you need to do is ask yourself some questions when you feel any strong emotion. And the two questions are these:

1. What is this emotion telling me about myself?
2. How can I use this information to feel accepting, empowered and calm in this situation?

An example could be feeling immense grief with the loss of a loved one or some other circumstance. If I was to ask myself the two questions above, I may answer:

1. This grief is telling me that I really loved the person who passed and shows me that I have a huge capacity for love.
2. I can fondly now accept this emotion of grief and realize that it is simply reminding me of my ability to love another person, which is a wonderful and noble quality. My ability to love another person is a beautiful gift.

You may be thinking to yourself – “ but I still have to endure the grief”  – so how excatly does this help me ?

Well – it helps in that you have now changed the perspective to one of grief as an expression of love and the joy found in human connections, as opposed to a feeling steeped in misery. And this change in perspective may really change your response to the grief itself, which is the key component in handling difficult emotions.

Another example could be handling disappointment or anxiety over performance outcomes.

Say, for example, that I had been working on a project or performance for many weeks or months and then it does not go to plan and the results are not as hoped for. Perhaps a student does not win the competition they hoped to win, and they are feeling great disappointment. Using the same process above I would ask the same questions:

1. What is this emotion telling me about myself?
2. How can I use this information to feel accepting and calm in this situation?

And my answers may be:

1. This disappointment is telling me that I value quality in everything I do- which is a productive and positive emotion. I am someone who values progress.
2. It can encourage me to feel pride in my quest for excellence. It may also tell me that I need to balance my view perhaps, and learn to appraise my efforts on the actual performance itself [ competing with myself ] as opposed to focusing on the subjective opinion of others.

Another example could be that you lose your job, but then feel an immense sense of joy and celebration after hearing the news. This may surprise you and you ask these questions again:

1. What is this emotion telling me about myself?
2. How can I use this information to feel accepting and calm in this situation?

You may answer these questions like this:

1. This emotion of joy at losing my job is telling me that I obviously did not really like working at that job ,or that I feel proud of my actions that caused my employment to be terminated.
2. I can use this feedback to now look for a job that is more meaningful to me and in alignment with what I truly wish to do and contribute to the world.

So, there you have it.

These are just a few examples but hopefully you get the idea.

In so many situations we tend to view our perceived negative emotions, as just that – negative. Whereas, in fact, if we can view all of our emotions as messengers from our soul, we can learn to sit in a space of joy and calm and thank the messenger. Even when that message comes in the form of a negative emotion like sadness, grief, anxiety or anger.

If all our emotions were happy, joyful and positive – we would miss all the important signals that can bring meaningful change or acceptance into our lives.

So, my advice today is to try this little technique out and see how you go.

Enjoy the process and have fun with it too. You may even like to start a journal where you take the time to examine your feelings and reactions to things. Just write down the situations and delve into finding out just what these emotions are telling you.

When you examine yourself and your reactions to things you will open a whole new world and enable a positive relationship to each and every emotion.

Discover Your Joy

Christine Denny
Director
christine@tapatak-oz.com
www.tapatak-oz.com
+61 408 683 221

NOTE: All Christine’s Joymaker columns are general in nature and written from the perspective of personal experience, research and study. They are offered here as advice and support only. Should you be experiencing serious mental health issues, financial concerns or medical issues of any kind we highly recommend you seek assistance from a trained professional.