Feelings, nothing more then feelings

Incidentally this is also today's art piece I created.

Last night my facebook status update read "I feel blah". It was what I was feeling at the time or rather the easiest thing to write. Maybe I should have wrote "I feel overwhelmed, over stimulated, I feel sad and upset, I feel gloomy with the grey wet weather." Instead I wrote I feel blah, a friend then commented saying wasn't I suppose to feel inspired and passionate, which is what I was posting about lately. And I do feel those emotions too but at that moment blah it was.

So why am I leading my blog post with this, because that comment sparked a whole emotional revolution in me. I am currently reading SARK's book Glad No Matter What, Transforming Loss and Change into Gift and Opportunity.. I've only recently been introduced to SARK she has many books that I would probably rather be reading but I since I'm on a grieving path on my journey called life I figured this may help me come to terms with my emotions.

In the book she talks about how in our society we try and dismiss our negative emotions. Move through them too quickly because we can't be sad or mad or blah. That we suppress them and move on to the "prettier" emotions the more fun ones. But when we do that those emotions we didn't acknowledge some back to haunt us in other ways overeating, drink, shopping, drugs, smoking, denial, etc. I know I did my share of those things (and still do, hello chocolate and bad moods). She talks about living with the uncomfortable emotions for a bit (a few seconds to longer) before moving on. She talks about transforming the emotions from the negative to the positive.

Acknowledging your feelings allows you to deal with them and move on. I remember after my FIL passed away, my MIL was sad and upset, she was missing her husband of 20 years (he died 1 day after their 20th wedding anniversary) and everyone kept telling her that he was better off and wasn't suffering and not to be sad. I was one of the few people that told her it's ok to be sad, it's ok to miss him. I mean she spent 20 years with him, how could she not be sad? Miss him? All normal feelings and yet she was expected to dismiss those valid feelings because it made others uncomfortable. It's one thing to be stuck in an emotion but taking the time to be in the feeling before moving on is healthy.

Another thing SARK talks about is that when dealing with our emotions it's done in layers and spirals. It's not a straight path where you feel the emotion and move on, you come back and revisit that feelings, transform it but the next time we will fell it differently. The same emotion but a different reaction to it. I can totally relate to this concept.

Right now I'm on the chapter where she talks about care giving for her mother and her working through the grief of losing both parents. Last night I was reading the section on care giving. OMG I could have written that section, I related to everything she talked about but most especially that caregiver guilt, the burnout. I felt like no one understood what I felt around that issue. No one in my immediate circle of friends and family went through that. While they tried to help but they couldn't relate. Do you know how GROUNDBREAKING it was to know that someone understands intimately what you're feeling, how the feelings consume you and you feel like they're taking over? Is was a HUGE breakthrough for me. I AM NOT ALONE. I AM NOT CRAZY. I AM NORMAL. I have just processed another layer of feelings.

Seriously that breakthrough last night made me want to sign on the rooftops. So while last night before I went to bed to read I felt blah. However before I went to sleep I felt understood, relieved, happy. I processed my emotions to get out on the other side. Blah, isn't a bad thing, it's an opportunity to tune in with our emotions.

On a side note I also think that part of my blah feelings was I was suppose to wake up early yesterday and go to the pool. Through a miscommunication with Rock he didn't wake me up and I didn't get that work out. I rectified that this morning.

I did 1500m this morning, the 750m is hovering at that 13-14 minute mark. Each time I feel better when I do the swim, I wish I could swing one more work out in the week but with child care I can only swing it twice a week for now. Maybe things will change.

I have figured out that I prefer the Tuesday/Thursday workout days as opposed to Wednesday/Friday. On Wednesday/Friday they have watercize and that means that there are more people in the lanes because they can't swim in the open area. More people means more people to pass. Some people don't understand swim etiquette when it comes to picking lanes by speed or about passing others or being passed. Lesson from today, try not to work out when the watercize is on.