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(12 pages) In today's class, I'd like to share the conceptual background information that can be useful to you in understanding and learning how to experience and deal with your own emotional feelings (and those of others) with mindfulness. Then I'll show you how to use your awareness to deal with each of the eight basic emotional feelings that are described in this class. Except perhaps for the subjects of "love," "God," and "death," there is no more mysterious subject to human beings, even highly educated human beings, than the subject of emotional feelings. Everybody knows that emotional feelings cause all kinds of dramatic problems in daily life, for our selves, and for other people as well. People also know that daily life would be kind of cold, flat, and unhuman without emotional feelings. We know that in our bones, don't we? We can sometimes see obvious emotional feelings overflowing in another person, and in us. We can sometimes have this same emotional overflowing going on in us and *not even be aware of it*. And yet despite the fact that most of us know that all this is going on, practically nobody knows anything *concrete and definite* about what specific emotional feelings *actually are*, how they are differentiated from one another, how they operate in our human make-up, and, finally, what can *actually* be done about them. Most humans are very, very vague about emotional feelings. I know, I know. There are scores of books out there on the shelves talking about all kinds of things about emotional feelings. But here, we are going to take a look at emotional feelings the same way you took a look at that soft, soft space between your computer monitor and *you* -- that is, with your ordinary human sense of touch. Grab up a ball of that space in your open hands now and see how soft it is.
As you may see today, emotional feelings feel a little harder than that empty space. Yet, it's just as easy to feel! In this class, I'd like to share a mindful perspective of emotional feelings. By that, I mean a perspective that you can see and experience directly by being mindful. You won't have to believe anything that I say about emotional feelings here, because you can check it all out first hand, on your own, step by step, and see what your own experience is. Whatever may become *obvious and apparent* for you along the way will be what you get from this class. What doesn't become obvious and apparent won't. In order to see and recognize the undeclared emotional feelings of other people, you need to use your senses of sight and hearing. But, in order to see and understand your own emotional feelings, you must rely *entirely* on your sense of touch. Emotional feelings are *feelable*. They are tangible. They are experienceable *sensations* within your body. You can actually feel your feelings. There is a *physicalness* about emotional feelings that you can sense directly with mindfulness. The reason for most of the confusion about emotional feelings is that people think that what they are supposed to be paying attention to in studying "emotions" is the "emotional" thinking and talking that is going on, and the "emotional" behavior that is going on--all of which is often quite a rampant display! But that is not what we are talking about here. With awareness, one can explore the realm of one's own emotions "in high relief" with an awakened perspective of *sensing* it, directly. That is what we are talking about here. One can get awarely *touched* by one's feelings in this way. Your feelings can "get all the way home" to your awakened attention! You can *know* and actually be "in touch" with your emotional feelings by doing this. That is what you have to catch-on to here, if you find that you are interested and would like to do this. To reiterate: if you really wish to know what your emotional feelings actually are, you have to look for them in your body with your sense of touch, and learn to recognize the distinct sensations of them. You can actually feel these characteristic sensations that they each have inside in there. So we are not talking about what you are thinking, saying, hearing, or doing *about* your emotional feelings here. We are just talking about *the emotional feelings themselves*, that you can feel within. You should be very clear about this. We are separating what you can feel of your emotions by sensing them directly into a class of its own. And this *alone* is what we are calling "emotional feelings" in this class. The sensations of emotional feelings are often quite subtle, but not always. It depends upon how emotional you are being. For instance, if you are just a little sad, you may have to sift for it in order to be able to feel it. If you are grieving a loss of love, it probably shows up pretty much in high relief, when you learn how to look for it in there. Before getting into how to feel the different emotional feelings (which will be done under separate links below), let's take a look at which emotional feelings we are talking about here. In this view, there are eight basic negative human emotional feelings: fear, loneliness, anger, jealousy, shame, anxiety, sadness, and guilt. All of these are distinctly feelable. You are familiar with hundreds of different words that describe different nuances of emotional feelings. All languages are rich in these. If you will be patient, I will try to show you how *all* of those words for emotional feelings can be sorted out to fit in with one or another of these eight basic feelings that we are working with here. These are basic themes that all emotional feelings tie in with. (Of course, it's NOT in the words that we have for feelings, but the *sensations* that we feel of them, that we are most interested in becoming focused on here! Yet having some basic words as terms for sorting things out while learning is very helpful.) And there are eight basic positive human emotional feelings that match-up with the basic negative feelings listed above. These are: courage (strength), solitude, humor, artistic sensitivity, sweet rest, enthusiasm, tenderness, and friendliness. All of these emotions are distinctly feelable in the body, as well. [These eight positive and negative emotional feelings match up as *typical* for each of the eight types of personality and essence that are described in the Playground classes. If you'd like to print out the "Emotions" plates of wheels from the wheelbook there, they will provide an appropriate blackboard for this class. -- Wheelbook, Emotions] The negative emotional feelings occur as a reaction when our body is impacted by things, bodies, and words (sounds) that enter our space. You may look at this event generally as "becoming upset at a situation that is going on," but what is actually happening, as you may learn to notice with awareness, is that certain specific physical things that you encounter in your space, the bodies of certain people (or animals) that come into your space, and the sounds that resonate through your space, such as the words that people speak *are* the actual impacts in life that kick-off these emotional feelings inside your body. The body clutches up when this impact occurs. It is the clutching up of the body's musculature that creates the different distinct sensations of the eight basic negative feelings that we can look for, find, and feel in our bodies. Emotional feelings are different specific ways that parts of your body clutch up when it is impacted by things that are encountered in your space. (Thinking about things that happened in the past can also have this effect of kicking off your emotional feelings the same way.) As you will see, it can be easy to sort these different emotional feelings out with your sense of touch. When this clutching up of the musculature is released, *that* is what creates the distinct sensations of the basic positive emotional feelings! Please notice that there is an *inward-outward* dynamic in the interplay of negative and positive emotional feelings. This is very valuable to see. When the feeling is negative, the body is clutched up. It gets "hard." Negative feelings are inward directed. When the feeling is positive, the body is expanding. It gets "soft." Positive feelings are outward directed. Inward, things become more material, or hard. Outward, they become more space, or soft. Can you get that image? Here, if you'd like, you can do a little dance that exemplifies this phenomenology occurring in the human body. Crouch down beside your chair there, roll your body up into a ball, and make a moaning sound. Then stand up and spread your arms and legs outward, and say: "Hooray!"
When the emotional feeling is negative, we are "uptight." The body squinches in on itself and becomes "more dense." When the feeling becomes positive, the body relaxes and expands outward, and becomes more loose, "more light." These are not just "buzz words." You can see and experience with mindfulness that this inward and outward interplay of negative and positive emotional feelings actually happens in your body. You get more uptight, you get more loose. You get more "gross," you get more "fine." You get more closed, you get more open. The more dense you actually become (although the spatial difference around the circumference of your body is not great), the "heavier" you get, the worse the situation is. The more light you actually get, the better and better it becomes. Open up. Expand. Be light. When you wake up and find that you are dense and heavy, experience it, and let it go. That's what this class is about, in a nutshell! Let's do another brief exercise here, please. Remain very aware of feeling the interior of your body. Sitting there in your chair, squinch up your whole body, one part at a time, beginning at the floor--feet, legs, trunk, fists, arms, neck, face--and hold onto it for a few seconds, and then . . . . . just let it all drop. And, then, stre-e-e-tch!
That is an exemplary enactment of your whole body becoming clutched up with negative emotional feelings from head to toe, then releasing them all, and feeling positive emotional feelings. (In more specific terms, that is what you will be learning to do, later on here, with each of the basic emotional feelings that are linked.) [The above exercise, by the way, is a good one to do while at your work-station, when you are taking a brief break from the intensity of your work and seeking to relax your body as much as possible with brief exercises while you can--as discussed in Classroom Talk. It is a "fifteen-second 'cover all bases' processing of any present bodily tensions." You have to do the whole thing with awareness. This is a good one to keep in your warrior's bag of tricks. You can do it anywhere!] Now, please look at your right hand, and feel within it keenly as you clutch it up into a tight fist, and then, aware of the sensations in your hand there, relax it to an open palm, and stretch.
There you can see a good sensory enactment of what happens within your body when certain parts of it become clutched up with a negative emotional feeling at any given point of any day, and when you let that feeling go, on purpose, by being very aware of it. In a way, this is just a "cartoon" experience of the process of working with emotional feelings. Yet I think it's a good idea for you to see and feel a sample of what it is that is going on in there with your emotional feelings this way. What we are talking about here is sometimes called "processing feelings," especially in the field of psychotherapy. In the gestalt therapy of the mid-20th Century, that is the name that was used. By placing your awareness directly into a palpable area of muscular tension--such as the sensations of an emotional feeling--you can "coax it" to relax by simply being aware of it and letting it unwind on the spot, on its own. One isn't attempting to "force anything out" in doing this. [This is important to catch on to.] One isn't trying to "drive anything away." One is simply acknowledging it and bringing as much awareness as possible to bear upon it--knowing it as thorougly as one can in mindfulness, as it is. The body, itself, begins then to relax, and let the tensions out. Maintaining focused awareness, one can feel this transition happening as the sensations perceptibly change. When one's strongest negative emotional feelings are thoroughly processed in this way, one is less prone to repetitive distressful thinking about the problem afterwards, less driven to be over-reacting to the problem as one may have been, less prone to be "upset about it all the time," even though cognizant of the problem's existence. One actually *feels better* anyway! Not being so uptight any more *feels good*--and, thus, one is much more able to just deal with the problem in a stronger, clearer, more practical, and less destructive way. And one can begin this type of work on one's negative emotional feelings *as soon as the problem has happened*!!! . . or . . . whenever one thinks of the problem again. Gestalt therapy also illustrated in high relief that people carry these tensions of negative emotional feelings around with us, long after the events that gave rise to them are over. This means that we go on and on reacting to those events, even when those events are no longer present in our space--even when they are only memories, and may have nothing whatsoever to do with what is going on right now in the present in any of our lives. Negative emotional feelings, when they are held within the body like this, are the pent up force that drives the human "self," as this self is described in our awareness game classes here--meaning the ego driven self of personality and manipulations. And humans *do* tend to hold these negative emotional tensions within their bodies without being aware that they are doing that. So we humans *are* driven by our emotional feelings. It is a characteristic of the "ordinary human condition." In this way, people go along "storing up" their negative feelings, walking around unconscious of it, while these negative feelings build up and build up. They are "engraved on a person's musculature like music on a phonograph record," if you will. And they are ready to "play" over and over again, whenever we think again about the problem that gave rise to them in the first place. Reactions to this just keep "dumping out" at intervals, coming out at inopportune times along the course of our lives. Yes, this explains why the problem and initial emotional reactions can occur with one person in a given location, and then be "dumped" when we are with yet another person in another location--even though there is really no connection between the two. We are uptight about one thing, and, unconsciously, we take it out on another. Or, a long time can pass without seeing the person the original incident took place with, and we think we have forgotten all about it, and as soon as we bump into them again, or even hear their name mentioned by somebody else, we can become immediately uptight again. It is the bound up energy of these emotionally clutched up muscles that, "unwinding," *drives* the human self. Unwinding, like the rubber-band engine of a paper airplane, this bound-up emotional energy gives rise to the thinking that runs on and on, and talking. Thinking gives rise to the desires of the ego, and these, in turn, give rise to the acting-out of our several primary personality types with their characteristic manipulations and defense mechanisms. Thus, it is the actual "wound-up" emotional energy that is stored in our uptight musculature that is "at the bottom of it all," so to speak. It *runs* this whole sleeping, automatic show--the manifestation of our--some approaches call it "lower"--self, your conditioned self, the unawakened self, the self that knows not of practicing mindfulness, and knows not that there *is* a "self" to be studied in such a way--or forgets this in between times of being awake. The sleeping self is driven by the retained emotional tensions that we are holding in our musculature as we go around doing the things we do in our lives. When one comes to know of this, one can actually do something about it. One can practice being aware of the emotional feelings that one has. One can practice patiently processing emotional feelings on through with awareness--doing this on purpose, I mean--as a sensible choice in daily maintainance of one's being. If one does this routinely during hours of the day, or regularly enough when strong emotional tensions begin building up again in their body, one can *preclude* all the thinking, wanting, and acting-out ego and personality that *would have* automatically emanated from all that bound-up emotional energy being unattended to! In other words, by regularly attending to one's emotional feelings with mindfulness in this way, acknowledging them, experiencing them fully, *processing* them, one cuts down, from within, on the amount of ego activity that one otherwise would automatically put out on others around and upon the world. This is a way that a classical warrior--regardless of the situation and circumstances that lie around at any time--can *be prepared*, can keep himself or herself in a state of emotional balance that is fitting for assertive actions and pauses, and not conducive instead to aggressive and passive reactions to life as it just is. Being run by our previous emotional reactions is an important factor that keeps us out of the present. Instead of being free to relate with the present elements of life with attention and interest, intelligence and objectivity, the ordinary person relates with the present out of fore-ordained emotional reactions that were set up in the past. And, if your body is clutched up, for instance, with fear that you are carrying around in your musculature, this unwinds to form fear scenarios in your daily life. And you live with fear. If your body is clutched up with sadness, it unwinds in the form of sadness scenarios that keep coming up in your daily life. And you live with sadness. And so on with the other basic emotional feelings--loneliness, anger, jealousy, shame, anxiety, guilt. If your body is clutched up with these, then you live with these in your life. Here you can see the potential value of *dealing with your emotional feelings* with mindfulness. If one can deal with fear, if one can deal with sadness, etc. then one can change the whole course of their life. The same things may keep going on all around you, yet the course of one's life can be changed from within. And instead of having to react to situations as you "always do," like "knee-jerk reactions" when the various powerful emotional feelings do arise in your daily life, you can become free to take action assertively, as you choose to do--independent of the emotional feeling, yet without denying that--depending instead on a present experience and understanding of the situation that's grounded in what's actually happening now. Another important thing to point out about emotional feelings is that they have *location*. They each usually show up in specific characteristic places inside the body. You won't find the sensations of anxiety in the same places that you feel the sensations of sadness, for example. Each emotional feeling has its own characteristic locations within the body. This makes it easier to differentiate between one emotional feeling and another. When you get used to knowing what they feel like, you can know where to look for them again. What do these emotional feelings feel like? That you will have to find out on your own, by experiencing the sensations of them directly in awareness. Tensions? Tingles? Tremors? Words will not suffice. Each feeling has its own characteristic sensational feeling that you can only get to know by feeling it. The "wanna cry" feeling of sadness is sort of well-known to people at large. Under the separate links below, we can begin to take an experiential look at each of these emotional feelings. I'll give you the best coaching tips that I can! Some of these feelings are easier to feel than others. This may have to do with our differing primary personality types, or with differing sensitivities. You will just have to see the way this goes for you. As always, we are NOT talking about imagination here! You *know* that already. We are talking about what you can actually feel, by being mindful and placing your awareness in the different places inside your body where your own emotional feelings can actually and palpably be felt. The more impactful, the more stressful, the more emotional the given situation is, the more easily emotional feelings can be felt when they are looked for in this way. And yet, on almost any day, there are circumstances that arise which impact upon us enough that some perceptible emotional feeling is likely to be somewhat present in a given person's body at almost any given time. I, personally, find that being able to identify the sensations of fear, anger, anxiety, and sadness are the easiest of the eight negative feelings to recognize palpably, for me. And, loneliness, jealousy, shame, and guilt may be more subtle in the sensations I experience of them. Yet I know that I experience all eight from time to time. Sometimes, on a given day, for instance, I am caught by surprise: "Oh yeah! Wow! There's loneliness! Ha! I can feel it clear as can be!" Students have told me they found different ones of the eight are easier and more difficult for them. I can see from this that our individual emotional lives are certainly different from each other. I strongly suppose that all of us have all eight of the basic emotional feelings at certain times in our life--times that are obviously quite appropriate for this, indeed! It is also obvious that our personal emotional feelings tend to match up closely with the primary types that we have on the personality wheel. So, in our study of the make-up of human beings here, I posit that each of us is much more often having the emotional feelings that go with our primary personality types--as the days are going by--than we have those other emotional feelings that go with the other types that aren't primary in us. Yet those, too, sometimes will come up. I'd be willing to guess that even those feelings which you think, at this time, never come up for you, do sometimes come up for you in any given month. So you will have to keep on the watch for all eight of them over a period of time, before you can know in your own experience what all eight of these negative emotional feelings actually feel like. It may be, in certain people's attitudes, that they "pride themselves" in *not having* certain of these emotional feelings. Even in such cases, I would invite students here to apply "beginner's mind," adopt a convention that they don't really know the truth of it without first exploring it with mindfulness, and then just "take what you get." There's no dishonor in having these emotional feelings. It is our human heritage--and despite the conventions of society--we are actually *blessed* in this way. For without the phenomena of the negative feelings we could not perceive the phenomena of the positive feelings. The ebb-and-flow of negative and positive emotional feelings in our lives adds a rich dimension to our existence as human beings. Without this we would be shockingly *less than human* as we know humanity now. The degree to which one can perceive the richness of this exchange of negative and positive emotional feelings in human life depends upon one's ability to be awake in mindfulness and tune-in to what is going on in this realm. Our emotional feelings are a language that we can all learn from--"in the language of the body's own wisdom," as my teacher Mits used to say. It is the body's *non-verbal* language. And, by using mindfulness to "hear" the body's natural wisdom in this language, we can also learn to heal ourselves from the adverse effects of the negative emotional feelings that do occur in all of our human lives. The rest of this class (in the following links) will show you how to recognize and work with each of the eight basic emotional feelings that are described in this approach. What have you got to lose? Well . . . fear, loneliness, anger, jealousy, shame, anxiety, sadness, and guilt--for refreshing periods of time, at least. And what have you got to gain? Well . . . courage, solitude, humor, artistic sensitivity, sweet rest, enthusiasm, tenderness, and friendliness--to be able to put into play in your life, on the spot, during those refreshing periods of time . . . if you'd like to. :-) Coach Back to the Top | Kindergarten | Classroom Talk ContactWebmaster 
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