Dear Joshua,

I’ve been spending more time in meditation, focusing on awareness of thought, and constantly reaching for better feeling thoughts. What it seems like is happening though, is that instead of self-avoiding with substance(s), it’s almost as if I’m self-avoiding with positive thoughts. The negative emotions are glossed over in the moment, and then tend to resurface the next time I’m faced with a similar situation. Are you suggesting that anytime I feel negative emotion, I should simply focus on finding a way to feel better?

— I realize that it’s not beneficial to me to wallow in my negative emotions, however, I wonder if those emotions need to be processed before I can fully let them go. I’ve spent my life trying to “feel better” in ways that don’t seem to last. Is there any value in “feeling the feelings”, no matter what they are, in order to release them and then be able to move on? Or maybe a better question is, what is the best way to process negative emotions in order to be able to then move on to positive emotions and thoughts?

Kyla

Dear Kyla,

There is value in feeling your emotions because this is a feeling reality. But since you’ve already felt most of the emotions available to you, wouldn’t you agree that some of the negative emotions are not pleasant? It’s not that you are avoiding negative emotion, it’s that the system is designed to lead you toward that which feels good because everything wanted is in the direction of what feels good.

When you feel negative emotion, it’s a result of using a perspective that is out of alignment with what you want and what you know to be true. There’s no harm in wallowing in self-pity every now and then. However, you must realize that this perspective isn’t helping you move toward what is wanted. It is simply resistance to what is.

Let’s use an example. Imagine you are playing monopoly with friends. You are having fun but you lose the game. Now you can adopt two perspectives; you are a loser, you’re unworthy and you will never play this game again, or you know that winning or losing has nothing to do with your worthiness and the game is fun regardless of the outcome. This seems like a simple analogy, but it works this way in every situation. You either find a perspective that supports who you really are and what you truly want or you chose another perspective that is based on a limiting belief about yourself or your world. Either way, you choose your own perspective.

The way you process negative emotion is to realize that it is caused by a limiting belief which is based on some irrational fear. If a belief is based on an irrational fear, it is always false. You can prove that the belief is false by finding evidence. Once you’ve found evidence that proves the belief is false, you have reduced the intensity of the belief and your world will shift in a new direction. When you process an emotion in this manner, you reduce the amount of fear you carry and increase the amount of love. This is what raises your vibrations to higher levels. When your vibration is raised and maintained there for a while, your world changes to reflect your new vibrational signal.

At first it will feel as if you are falsely denying the negative emotions or thoughts by replacing them with better-feeling thoughts. It will feel a bit off. You will think you’re simply white washing the problem. But there really is no problem for you to solve. If you will work on feeling good, choosing the perspective that allows you to feel better, and process your emotions by analyzing the limiting beliefs which caused the negative emotion in the first place, you’ll raise your vibration and in time your world will shift in ways you cannot yet imagine.

Soon you will master the art of perspective. It will become a positive habit. You will be able to feel the negative emotion fully and quickly realize that you’re simply looking at the event in a way that does not support you. You’ll pivot to a new perspective and move on. You’ll stop and think about the limiting belief based in fear which gave rise to the negative emotion. You’ll find evidence that the belief was false and in doing so you’ll reduce the intensity of that belief forever. You are on a never-ending journey of expansion and you’re constantly raising your vibration. Spend more time feeling good and less time feeling bad. This is how the system was designed.

There is far more for you to learn so take it easy on yourself. You are doing a wonderful job. You are here to expand through experience. You are here to use your powers of creation. You are here to follow your interests and find your passion. You are making great progress. You are one of the few who have raised their vibration high enough to find us.

You are love and you are loved.

Joshua