No Feel, No Deal, No Heal

There’s a question David Hawkins asks in Letting Go: The Pathway to Surrender that has been sitting with me lately: Can I feel what I feel without allowing the feeling to control what I do?

If you had asked me this last week, I would have said no. Not because I don’t want to grow, but because when I observe myself honestly, I see the patterns. I see the ways I try to escape the intensity of my own emotions.

For me, it’s usually one of three things: food, isolation, or doom scrolling.  My holy trinity of avoidance.

When a feeling comes up that I don’t want to face, I reach for something , anything , that will distract me from the discomfort. 

And I’ve learned something about myself in that cycle: no feel, no deal, no heal. If I don’t allow myself to feel it, I can’t deal with it. And if I don’t deal with it, I definitely can’t heal it.

Avoidance has many costumes. Sometimes it looks like depending on something. Sometimes it looks like cutting someone off. Sometimes it looks like pretending I don’t care. Sometimes it looks like disappearing into myself.

But underneath all of that is one simple truth: I don’t want to feel what I feel.

And Hawkins’ question is pulling me back to Self. Back to the place where I can sit with the feeling without letting it run my life. Back to the place where I can observe the emotion without becoming it. Back to the place where I can choose my action from my values, not my triggers.

I’m learning that the feeling is not the enemy. The resistance to the feeling is what creates the spiral.

So starting now, today as a matter of fact, I’m practicing something different. I’m practicing staying. Staying with the discomfort long enough to hear what it’s trying to teach me. Staying with the emotion without obeying it. Staying with myself instead of abandoning myself.

Because maybe the real question is not “Can I feel without reacting?” Maybe the real question is: Can I trust myself enough to stay present with what I feel?

I’m learning. I’m unlearning. I’m surrendering. And I’m choosing, slowly, gently, to feel, deal, and heal.

Peace and Blessings