Emotions and Meditation
“Only the strong survive.” Why in society do we only concentrate our emotional teachings on strength…never showing you or one can break…”Don’t let them see you sweat”…we say…”Don’t let them break you.”
Chapter 7 in Discover Your Superpower was a refreshing read. I say this because it was straight forward and focused on the topic many people in society do not like to discuss and that is our emotions outside of anger. As Mrs. Paul symbolically used Bruce Banner (The Hulk) as the example to discussion emotions, I believe it was a great way to illustrate how society wrestles with expressing our innermost emotions. The missing levels of emotions as Mrs. Paul calls them: fear, anxiousness, insecure, unsure, threatened, wronged, rejected, sad, lonely, vulnerable, disappointed, and ashamed. We are taught not to discuss these emotions because each of the emotions referenced above means you are vulnerable and essentially to society vulnerability mean you are weak. As Mrs. Paul stated, “…so we are a walking generation of angry people with pinned up emotions.” Reading Chapter 7 made me question am I wearing or shielding emotions that may be buried deep inside of me…am I carrying emotional baggage? When was the last time I stopped and let my mind be still? When have I meditated? Mrs. Paul discussed some very real truths in this chapter, as a society we are broken individuals because we fail to deal with our whole self (all of our emotions). So, the easiest way to express the brokenness is through the easiest emotion anger…but what if we took the time to connect with one of the vulnerable emotions listed above and actually expressed them perhaps the healing can occur and your metaphoric bag of emotions would be extremely small. I have a five-year-old daughter who does a fabulous job of expressing her emotions ALL OF THEM. If you hurt her feelings/make her sad, the next conversation is “Mommy you made me sad or you hurt my feelings when you did X.” I always listen to her and I respond on why I said or did whatever action made her feel a certain way, but what I do not do is tell her to toughen-up or get over it, because it is important to me that she understands how she feels and can express it. My five-year-old is able to reflect on her emotions, connect with the emotion, and then express how it made her feel. This leads me to Mrs. Paul’s final discussion point in Chapter 7 “Meditation is life changing…it creates a space to allow us to control our minds.” This was a powerful quote to me because I am a person that sleeps little because my mind is always going. Mrs. Paul states, “Meditation is not easy. It takes practice…” She is certainly correct. We are told to stay physically fit… it is a billion dollar industry, but when are we encouraged to rest or relax our mind. Meditation, as stated in the chapter, can lead to mindfulness and better self-awareness. If I am more self-aware would I be able to wield all of the gifts God has given me?
Chapter 7 was powerful because there was so much it made me think of and reflect on from my lens as well as my children’s lens. Am I connecting with all my emotion? Am I expressing my emotions outside of anger? When can I meditate and how do I begin? ~Leshel Hutchings, AVP Senior Compliance Officer, Westerville, Ohio
Posted in: Chapter Reviews