Emotions are one of the most miraculous parts of being alive. The Angels often say that it’s the thing they admire most about the human experience—the ability to feel so many different things. Yet, we often take this for granted and refuse to acknowledge our emotions, no less give them the time and space they need to express.

As sensitive and empathetic people, we are on the lookout for guarantees of safety before we allow ourselves to feel. We’ve learned that we feel deeply and thoroughly, and have adopted several beliefs about what that means.

Here are a few of the big ones:

• We’ll get stuck in these feelings and not be able to navigate out.
• As spiritual people, there are some feelings we should never experience.
• The proper support systems just don’t exist for us.
• We don’t have enough time or energy.
• The things we are doing for others are too important and we will come back and deal with this at a better time. (Which we rarely do!)

In a time where there is so much to feel and so little time to do it, we wonder why we aren’t clear and can’t seem to receive messages from our higher selves, Angels, guides, and the Divine. This lack of clarity directly correlates to our relationship with our emotions because when we refuse to feel, we create blockages in our systems by stuffing them down. Over time, they become crystallized energy which prevents our life force from flowing freely—clogging the channel and inhibiting our ability to receive and act on guidance.

When we close ourselves off to our feelings, we limit our range and experience of being ALIVE. Closing ourselves off in one area means creating constriction in all areas. We can’t selectively dull and block out “negative” emotions without also dulling our experiences of joy, happiness, and other “positive” feelings.

Take anger, for example. This is an energy of great motivation, yet so many of us deem it inappropriate to feel. Refuse to acknowledge our anger and explore why it is there causes us to miss the gift that it brings and leaves us feeling confused, dull, depressed, and off-purpose.

Anger shows us what needs to change and why. It points us in the direction of our next step—personally and/or globally.

Once we become aware of any emotion, we have two options:
1. Push it down. This requires that we expend a lot of energy trying to keep it in and quiet it. Eventually, this can manifest as dis-ease in the mind and body, as well as exhaustion and depletion.

2. Process it. Accept that the feeling is present in your current experience. Acknowledge it. Ask why it is there. What is the catalyst for you? Allow it to show you.
Often this acknowledgment is enough—the message has been delivered. The emotion’s purpose has been served, and it can dissipate. Sometimes, though, we need to work the residual effects out of our bodies with movement, breathwork, prayer, art, chanting, or whatever works for you.

Caution: These actions only have the intended effect if we don’t skip the exploration. This might even lead you to more feelings and greater self-knowledge!

Once you have this knowledge, Universe/God/Higher Self can guide you to the next right action. You are ready to receive because your channel is not blocked off by unexplored and unprocessed emotions.

There are several things that we can do as spiritual sensitives to begin to reclaim our emotional health:

• Be willing to see where our support structures might need to change.
We often repeatedly return to the people we think are supposed to be able to support us, but have proven time after time that they are not capable of adequately doing so. It’s time to recognize that pattern and become open to creating something different—because we deserve better!

• Become willing to let go of the belief that we are too much. We tell ourselves that there is no one out there who can handle or support us in our entirety. Guess what? There are people out there who can handle all of us. They are reading this right now and feeling the same way. Holding this idea has prevented us from finding each other. Let it go.

• Become willing to grow through the wound. When we want to manifest a different experience, all our wounding comes up along with fears because we don’t know what it will be like to have it. We fear being lost, left all alone, that we will float off into space completely unnoticed. We need to be willing to face those fears and scars head-on so that we can come out the other side with the co-created experience we desire.

• STOP carrying others through their process. As healers, hurting people naturally seek us out. As caretakers, we then put their needs first. But, because this pattern keeps us depleted, we forget that we have to let them go and end up carrying them and their need for healing around in our thoughts and aura. This is as ridiculous as a doctor carrying a patient around on her back until the person feels better. It takes a lot of energy and is completely unnecessary.

We need to remember to disconnect and allow others to experience their process, even when we have our own feelings to move through about it.

• Remember that feelings aren’t facts. They are, however, the way our systems process energy. Examining them and allowing them to move through helps us to remain in the flow and claim the gifts and guidance that any emotion brings.

If you want to experience as much synchronicity, ease, and grace as possible, let your feelings run through your body as water would. Be present with them at the time they surface in order to avoid a backlog of energy that will affect your clarity and creativity in a time when it is needed perhaps more than ever before.