Walls
As many of you know, at some point in life most of us will experience trauma or significant emotional pain. Darker moments in life can bring us back to these feelings. The experience is very intense and often overwhelming.
One way to respond to intense feelings is to suppress them—I’ve got lots of experience doing exactly this. We ignore or deny these feelings in an attempt to feel better. And in my opinion, this is the cause of most emotional suffering.
Short-term, this strategy might actually work at helping us feel better. But the irony is that in an attempt to move away from those unwanted feelings in the moment, we actually end-up bringing them infinitely closer over time.
Long-term, this attempt to suppress what we feel may slow us down drastically, and even dims our light.
When we deny our feelings, we begin to close off. This slow-moving, dense energy inevitably becomes an emotional blockage. Like a wall surrounding our hearts, we end up trapping those heavier feelings deeper inside us.
It’s kind of like asking a roommate that you loathe to sign a 20-year lease with you.
That which we are trying to push away ends up owning real estate inside our most precious possession — our hearts.
For me, healing happened when I realized that darkness is not evil or a bottomless pit. The pain I was feeling was merely a giant emotional wall, between the light of my heart and the rest of the world.
These blockages living within each of us prevent the magnificent beauty of our light from shining out into the world. And for some of us, the walls are so sophisticated and clever that we don’t even see them.
I think Michael Singer said it best in his powerful book The Surrender Experiment:
Pain is the cost of freedom.
Stepping into the pain can feel scary.
Every step you may feel darker, because it’s closer to the blockages.
Every step may feel isolating, because you’re further away from the surface and its many distractions.
But remember:
With every courageous step you take into the depths of your heart, you are also stepping closer to your light and joy. And even though it seems darkest as your approach your own emotional wall, know that just inches behind that wall is the most beautiful light in the Universe. The light from your own heart.
