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How to deal with feelings

Thinking and feeling are two functions of our mind that guide our lives. While the thought processes are in our conscious control, feelings appear to be uncontrollable; if not handled properly they can cause us serious consequences. Here are some tips on how to deal with feelings.

A mature approach to handle our feelings

For many persons, the negative feelings such as guilt, fear and suffering act as barriers to their living life fully. In order to overcome them, one must understand the sources of such feelings. We not only experience negative feelings of gloom, distress and desolation but also positive feelings like exhilaration, enthusiasm and sense of joy. The best way to deal with feelings is to analyze their sources, which is possible only with honest introspection. When an individual is faced with situations wherein his or her thoughts contradict the feelings, not being able to resolve them can be very costly. The most difficult aspect of handling the feelings is that they are not in our conscious control. By understanding the nature of feelings and their role in our lives, it is possible to overcome the negative effects of irrational feelings. On the other hand, the cultivation of positive feelings of self-esteem, respect, admiration and love can make our lives worth. But the ability to develop positive feelings and discard the irrational feelings is not easy; it requires constant effort till we come out of negative feelings and cultivate the positive feelings as a matter of habit.

Understanding is the key to handle feelings

What are feelings? Feelings or emotions work automatically and give us an estimation of a situation. While we are conscious of our thoughts and can direct them at our will, the same is not true of feelings. They appear as a background for our conscious thinking and dealing with reality. This fact can be realized when you observe your own mental reactions when you see a movie. While your conscious mind is in process of understanding the story, dialogues, background and as many details as possible, your emotional set up makes you experience the sense of gloom or joy depending on the current scene. The same is true when you face different situations in real life like meeting an old friend you missed, a person you hated, or received admiration for your achievements. Your feelings will tell you that the situation you are currently facing is “threatening” or “pleasant”. But there are many situations when you feel such feelings without any apparent context in reality. If such feelings are experienced for long time, people will feel distressed without any apparent causes and in severe cases they may acquire one or other types of phobias. If we deal with feelings as normal reaction of our mind to different situations, we can understand them and avoid being overwhelmed by them.

Introspection leads to understanding of your feelings

Contrary to popularly held beliefs, feelings are not inherent part of our mental make-up. Because of this wrong belief many believe that they are helpless about the way they feel. For example, a person afraid of certain normal activities like making a speech, speaking to member of opposite sex, living away from family can not be convinced about the irrationality of his fears by your logical persuasion. His feelings block his thought processes and no argument can stave off his fears. The matter becomes more complex when such individuals start hiding these fears and avoiding the situations by giving some false justifications to others and tragically, to themselves! When a person reaches such stage of self-deception, the negative feelings take rein of the mind and severely harm the person.

This can be overcome only by honest introspection without any excuse or justification. One has to think about the situations he is afraid of or feels distressed and try to think deeply on how he began to experience such feelings. This will lead to the understanding about his ideas- real or imagined, that were causing these negative feelings and which will empower him to overcome the negative emotions.

Watch your feelings constantly

The feelings you experience today are the results of your understanding of reality cemented in the long past. Many times, childhood experiences and forced opinions which were accepted without rational thought breed negative feelings. In order to overcome these, you must analyze the realistic basis of the feelings you are experiencing. If you find that the feelings contradict facts of reality, you must discard them and act accordingly. Only by repeating such acts you will find that such feelings will fade away. for example, many individuals live with feeling of causeless guilt and inferiority complex which make it impossible for them to deal with others with confidence. But if you realize that others value your deeds rather than your feelings, you will be able to overcome it by proving your worth through your actions.

The same is true about the “good feelings”. They can also be harmful if they are not based on reality. Many times we feel that some persons are good because of their external appearance and sweet talk. It is common tragedy of many “love stories” where people get cheated by their wrong feelings. It is necessary to judge your feelings based on rational judgment rather than your feelings. Is it not ironic that our popular literature and movies teach us to follow the “heart” not the “head”, which is the root cause of such problems?

Once you practice the art of analyzing all your feelings based on clear thinking, and discarding the negative feelings, you will be able enjoy your life to the fullest extent.

Living with harmony of thought and feelings

As feelings are result of our thought processes evaluating a situation based on past experiences, the subconscious mind gives automatic estimation about a situation either as good or bad. So naturally feelings help us live better. But if we do not understand our feelings, then our life will be tormented by conflict of following our convictions against feelings. But by understanding the nature of feelings, you can have a personality that is not split between unnecessary conflicts restricting our range of actions and capacity to enjoy life fully.

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