STWDM3 - Begin With Emotional Balance

Day 3 Message: Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance, order, rhythm, 

and harmony.   ― Thomas Merton

When we act from a feeling of lack, we remain out of balance and stuck in our old unfulfilling habits. But emotions are meant to flow freely, to rise and fall without being held. In meditation, we reach the calm, centered place inside that doesn’t hold on or get stuck to toxic habits and old memories, so shedding emotional baggage happens naturally.

O:  Often we become attached to the habit of negative feelings.  I used to live that way – where the same negative tapes played over and over.  Well, those feelings can take hold of us if we allow them to.  We bury them, they get rooted deep within us and then they begin to control us and it’s really easy to get stuck.  I’ve been there, I know.  It’s easy to lose your emotional balance by playing the same negative tapes but you have the power to turn the message around.  In reality, feelings come and go.  Feelings change – that’s what they are supposed to do.  By being still, you can create space for the natural flow of emotions – both positive and negative, and release ourselves from the burden of heaviness.  Find your still space.  Let yourself be still and from that centered place, all feelings can flow to the surface. They move through you rather than hold you and weigh you down.  Our truest present moment is always filled with a sense of love and hopefulness.  As your feelings flow, you become lighter.  Heaviness, the weight, disappears and anything seems possible.

D: Life is meant to flow and when anything gets stuck, our life moves out of balance.  This is especially true of emotions.  Negative emotions feels uncomfortable and we reflexively want to dispel them.  And yet, somehow, they stick around as depression, anxiety, guilt, envy, regret and dissatisfaction.  Even when you aren’t feeling the discomfort of negative emotions, they still pull us out of balance beneath the cover of everyday attitudes like complacency, procrastination and resentment.  This toxic residue from the past monopolizes your attention and undermines your sense of self-worth.  When you live in a state of emotional imbalance, you create a feedback loop that pushes you further out of balance.  Emotions are healed only from their source.  In our meditations the experience of finding inner peace and calm helps emotions to flow freely.  When you aren’t holding on, your emotions do what they are meant to do – move on.

It feels good to let it all out so why don’t we?  Think of an emotion you find hard to express.  Perhaps it’s anger.  It’s not that anger is positive, or even especially useful but you need to learn that it doesn’t define you.  Shedding emotional baggage is the same as getting unstuck and this takes conscious awareness.  The rule here is simple but profound.  Whatever you are not aware of cannot be healed.  Healing is the goal, not condemning or hiding from your difficult emotions.  Emotional turmoil isn’t the illness, only the symptom.  The illness is a sense of lack.  ‘I’m not good enough’ is what causes people to look for fulfillment externally where it can never be found.  The real solution is to recognize that our present self-awareness is already and always full with love, compassion, empathy, gratitude and caring.  All of these qualities of consciousness exist abundantly inside you as your essential self.

Journal Ideas: 1. Reflect on a negative situation in the past that you didn’t handle as well as you would have liked to. Write down how you could respond differently next time.  2.  Describe a moment yesterday or today where you felt a sense of flow and ease. That is what a life in balance feels like.  3.  Write about an area of your life – such as your relationships, job, or health – where you would like to experience more flow and balance. Go on to describe how that would change your experience of that area of life.