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Have you ever wondered how many emotions you can feel throughout a normal day? I’ve been thinking about this question a lot lately. The reason for my recent curiosity is the feedback I’ve received from some friends regarding certain situations I’ve gone through. I know talking about emotions is like jumping into the middle of the ocean—we can go deep and still not get anywhere. But I like challenges, 😊 so here we go.
First of all, do you know what emotions are? If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you know I like to get down to the very basics to explain my points in a better way. Oxford Languages defines emotions as, “A natural, instinctive state of mind deriving from one’s circumstances, mood, or relationships with others.” Merriam Webster defines emotions as, “A conscious mental reaction (such as anger or fear) subjectively experienced as strong feeling, usually directed toward a specific object and typically accompanied by physiological and behavioral changes in the body.” So, in my opinion, emotions are basically reactions.
We are all triggered by different circumstances and situations, and we react to them with any of the emotions we pack with us. Human emotions can be classified in many different ways, and it would take more than one post to go over all of them, so I’m going to discuss the most basic ones. Paul Eckman’s basic emotions list includes: happiness, sadness, fear, disgust, anger, and surprise.
My question is, how many of these basic emotions can you experience in one day? I don’t know about you, but I can easily feel all of them in a 24-hour period. I mentioned earlier that the reason behind my curiosity about emotions was the feedback I’ve received from some of my friends when I’ve shared some of my reactions to certain situations with them.
A few months ago, I was in my office, working as usual. I was having a great day, and I was feeling happy. In a matter of minutes, I received a few phone calls and emails that completely changed my state of mind. I jumped from happiness to sadness and fear in seconds, so I talked to a friend to vent and let out my emotions. He told me, “I don’t understand why you’re crying. What about all your meditation and mindfulness work? Is that just BS?”
I went completely quiet. I stopped crying, and I did what I used to do a lot in the past: I shut down the emotions I was feeling and forced myself to bypass them as quickly as I could. I didn’t know what else to do. I felt ashamed because I thought he was right. Even though I know emotions are like clouds that come and go, I didn’t feel strong enough to explain it to him.
That little conversation stuck in my mind for long time. Weeks later, when I was telling another friend how frustrated and sad I became when I hurt my ankle, she asked me the same question: “Where is all your meditation work? Why do you get sad and frustrated when you keep saying meditation is part of your daily routine?”
Again, I became completely quiet. I simply didn’t have an answer for her (or for me, actually). Even though I wrote a full post a few months ago about being okay with not being okay, and I know we all have ups and downs and need to go with the flow, I was still not completely aware of what meditation actually does or doesn’t do with our emotions.
For a moment, I was a little confused. I wanted to have an answer for my friends because I truly believe meditation is the best gift I have ever given myself, but I didn’t know how to explain it to them.
I know meditation does not suppress or demolish emotions; it only helps us to be aware of them. But what do we do when we are face-to-face with those emotions? Does meditation give us a superpower that makes us win the battle against our emotions? Well, the answer to this question depends on what you think is the best approach to attain inner peace. If you think that bypassing the emotion is the best way to win the battle, then no. Meditation (when practiced with intention) won’t help you to bypass emotions. But if you think that sitting with the emotion and letting it show you what it means is a better approach then yes, meditation will take you there.
The secret is to understand that we should not feel we need to fight our emotions. We were packed with emotions for a reason. They all have a purpose. That inner peace we sometimes are so desperate to find doesn’t mean we’ll live in a never-ending state of happiness. I believe we reach that beautiful inner peace when we finally understand that all emotions have meaning and we accept them as they come and go.
So, to all my dear friends—yes, I do love my meditation practice. And no, my meditation practice won’t make me emotionless. I will keep feeling happy, sad, angry, surprised, amazed, afraid, frustrated, and everything in between because I am as human as you are. My meditation practice is not BS; it helps me to be aware of all my emotions and accept them as the powerful guides they are.
Love,
Irene
