Welcoming Our Emotions

One of the most common things I work on with people is learning to name, experience and eventually welcome emotions into their daily experience. So many people are regularly trying to avoid those emotions - trying not to feel whatever it is they’re uncomfortable with. Avoiding emotions can take many different forms from numbing with drugs, alcohol, spending, sex or food or routinely resorting to anger or abandoning important people and relationships when things get too tough.

People often label emotions as “good” or “bad”, and therefore “bad” is to be avoided. Do you ever think of your emotions this way? There’s really no such thing as a good emotion or a bad emotion - just emotions that we prefer to feel or prefer to avoid. Every emotion has its appropriate and healthy place and time. If I asked you what your most difficult emotion to feel or express is, what would you say? What about the easiest? Now, a harder question - why?

Everyone’s answers will be a little bit different depending on your personality, current mental health and your experiences of life up to this point.

I want to share one of my favorite poems with you.

The Guest House by Jalaluddin Rumi

“This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.”

I love this poem because it illustrates the beautiful and profound idea to welcome in all of our emotions - not just the ones that are pleasant or that we prefer to feel.

I share this poem frequently in sessions, and it often leads to one of my favorite therapy moments. The moment when the person in front of me says, “I never thought of it that way before!” This is a moment where they are gaining perspective, a moment of learning about themselves, about life and about ways to improve their day to day.

I also experience joy and an interconnectedness in this same moment. I think that means that things are just as they should be and I am grateful.